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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Recollections of Europe, by J. Fenimore Cooper
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Recollections of Europe
+
+Author: J. Fenimore Cooper
+
+Release Date: November 30, 2006 [EBook #19983]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RECOLLECTIONS OF EUROPE ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Carlo Traverso, Mireille Harmelin and the
+Online Distributed Proofreaders Europe at
+http://dp.rastko.net. This file was produced from images
+generously made available by the Bibliothèque nationale
+de France (BnF/Gallica)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+COLLECTION OF ANCIENT AND MODERN BRITISH AUTHORS.
+
+VOL. CLXXII.
+
+RECOLLECTIONS OF EUROPE.
+
+PRINTED BY J. SMITH, 16, RUE MONTMORENCY.
+
+
+
+
+RECOLLECTIONS OF EUROPE.
+
+BY J. FENIMORE COOPER, ESQ.
+
+AUTHOR OF "THE PILOT," "THE SPY", etc.
+
+
+PARIS, BAUDRY'S EUROPEAN LIBRARY,
+RUE DU COQ, NEAR THE LOUVRE.
+
+
+1837.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+LETTER I.
+
+Our Embarkation.--Leave-taking.--Our Abigail.--Bay of New York.--The
+Hudson.--Ominous Prediction.--The Prophet falsified.--Enter the
+Atlantic.--"Land-birds."--Our Master.--Officers of Packet-ships.--Loss
+of "The Crisis."--The "Three Chimneys."--Calamities at Sea.
+--Sailing-match.--View of the Eddystone.--The Don Quixote.--Comparative
+Sailing.--Pilot-boats.--Coast of Dorsetshire.--The Needles.
+--Lymington.--Southampton Water.--The Custom-house.
+
+
+LETTER II.
+
+Controversy at Cowes.--Custom-house Civility.--English Costume.--Fashion
+in America.--Quadrilles in New York.--Cowes.--Nautical Gallantry.
+English Beauty.--Isle of Wight Butter.--English Scenery.--M'Adamized
+Roads.--Old Village Church.--Rural Interment.--Pauper's
+Grave.--Carisbrooke Cattle.--Southampton.--Waiter at the Vine.--English
+Costume.--Affinity with England.--Netley Abbey.--Southampton Cockneys.
+
+
+LETTER III.
+
+Road to London.--Royal Pastime.--Cockney Coachman.--Winchester Assizes.
+--Approach to London.--The Parks.--Piccadilly.--Street Excursion.
+--Strangers in London.--Americans in England.--Westminster Abbey.
+--Gothic Decorations.--Westminster Hall.--Inquisitive Barber.--Pasta and
+Malibran.--Drury-lane Theatre.--A Pickpocket.--A Fellow-traveller.
+--English Gentlemen.--A Radical.--Encampment of Gipsies.--National
+Distinctions.--Antiquities.--National Peculiarities.
+
+
+LETTER IV.
+
+Quit England.--Approach to France.--Havre.--Our Reception there.--Female
+Commissionnaire.--Clamour of Drums.--Port of Havre.--Projected
+Enterprize.--American Enterprize.--Steam-boat
+Excursion.--Honfleur.--Rouen.--French Exaction.--American
+Porters.--Rouen Cathedral.--Our Cicerone.--A Diligence.--Picturesque
+Road.--European Peasantry.--Aspect of the Country.--Church at
+Louviers.--Village near Vernon.--Rosny.--Mantes.--Bourbon Magnificence.
+--Approach to Paris--Enter Paris.
+
+
+LETTER V.
+
+Paris in August 1826.--Montmartre.--The Octroi.--View of Paris.
+--Montmorency.--Royal Residences.--Duke of Bordeaux.--Horse-racing.
+--The Dauphine.--Popular feeling in Paris.--Royal Equipage.--Gardes du
+Corps.--Policy of Napoleon.--Centralization.
+
+
+LETTER VI.
+
+Letters of Introduction.--European Etiquette.--Diplomatic
+Entertainments.--Ladies in Coffee-houses.--French Hospitality.--Mr.
+Canning at Paris.--Parisian Hotels.--French Lady at
+Washington.--Receptions in Paris and in New York.--Mode of
+Announcement.--Republican Affectation.--Hotel Monaco.--Dinner given to
+Mr. Canning.--Diplomatic Etiquette.--European Ambassadors.--Prime
+Minister of France.--Mr. Canning.--Count Pozzo di Borgo.--Precedency at
+Dinner.--American Etiquette.--A French Dinner.--Servants.--Catholic
+Fasting.--Conversation with Canning.--English Prejudice against
+Americans.
+
+
+LETTER VII.
+
+English Jurisprudence.--English Justice.--Justice in
+France.--Continental Jurisprudence.--Juries.--Legal Injustice.--The Bar
+in France.--Precedence of the Law.
+
+
+LETTER VIII.
+
+Army of France.--Military Display.--Fête of the Trocadero.--Royal
+Review.--Royal Ordinance.--Dissatisfaction.--Hostile
+Demonstration.--Dispersion of Rioters.--French Cavalry.--Learned
+Coachman.--Use of Cavalry.--Cavalry Operations.--The
+Conscription.--National Defence.--Napoleon's Marshals.--Marshal
+Soult--Disaffection of the Army.
+
+
+LETTER IX
+
+Royal Dinner.--Magnificence and Comfort.--Salle de Diane.--Prince de
+Condé.--Duke of Orleans.--The Dinner-table.--The Dauphin.--Sires de
+Coucy.--The Dauphine.--Ancient Usages--M. de Talleyrand.--Charles X.
+--Panoramic Procession.--Droll Effect.--The Dinner.--M. de Talleyrand's
+Office.--The Duchesse de Berri.--The Catastrophe.--An Aristocratic
+Quarrel.
+
+
+LETTER X.
+
+Road to Versailles.--Origin of Versailles.--The present Chateau.--The
+two Trianons.--La Petite Suisse.--Royal Pastime.--Gardens of Versailles.
+--The State Apartments.--Marie Antoinette's Chamber.--Death of Louis XV.
+--Oeil de Boeuf.--The Theatre and Chapel.--A
+Quarry.--Caverns.--Compiègne.--Chateau de Pierre-font.--Influence of
+Monarchy.--Orangery at Versailles.
+
+
+LETTER XI.
+
+Laws of Intercourse.--Americans in Europe.--Americans and English.
+--Visiting in America.--Etiquette of Visits.--Presentations at Foreign
+Courts.--Royal Receptions.--American Pride.--Pay of the President.
+--American Diplomatist.
+
+
+LETTER XII.
+
+Sir Walter Scott in Paris.--Conversation with him.--Copyright in
+America.--Miss Scott.--French Compliments.--Sir Walter Scott's Person
+and Manners.--Ignorance as to America.--French Commerce.--French
+Translations.--American Luxury.
+
+
+LETTER XIII.
+
+French Manufactures.--Sèvres China.--Tapestry of the Gobelins.--Paper
+for Hangings.--The Savonnerie.--French Carpets.--American Carpets.
+--Transfer of old Pictures from Wood to Canvass.--Coronation Coach.
+--The Arts in France--in America.--American Prejudice.
+
+
+LETTER XIV.
+
+False Notions.--Continental Manners.--People of Paris.--Parisian Women.
+--French Beauty.--Men of France.--French Soldiers.
+
+
+LETTER XV.
+
+Perversion of Institutions.--The French Academy.--Laplace.--Astronomy.
+--Theatres of Paris.--Immoral Plot.--Artificial Feelings.--French
+Tragedy.--Literary Mania.--The American Press.--American
+Newspapers.--French Journals--Publishing Manoeuvres.--Madame Malibran.
+
+
+LETTER XVI.
+
+Environs of Paris.--Village of St. Ouen.--Our House there.--Life on the
+River.--Parisian Cockneys.--A pretty Grisette.--Voyage across the
+Seine.--A rash Adventurer.--Village Fête.--Montmorency.--View near
+Paris.
+
+
+LETTER XVII.
+
+Rural Drives.--French Peasantry.--View of Montmartre.--The Boulevards.
+--The Abattoirs.--Search for Lodgings.--A queer Breakfast.--Royal
+Progresses and Magnificence.--French Carriages and Horses.--Modes of
+Conveyance.--Drunkenness.--French Criminal Justice.--Marvellous Stories
+of the Police.
+
+
+LETTER XVIII.
+
+Personal Intercourse.--Parisian Society and Hospitality.--Influence of
+Money.--Fiacres.--M. de Lameth.--Strife of Courtesy.--Standard of
+Delicacy.--French Dinners.--Mode of Visiting.--The Chancellor of France.
+--The Marquis de Marbois.--Political Côteries.--Paris Lodgings.--A
+French Party.--An English Party.--A splendid Ball.--Effects of good
+Breeding.--Characteristic Traits.--Influence of a Court.
+
+
+LETTER XIX.
+
+Garden of the Tuileries.--The French Parliament.--Parliamentary
+Speakers.--The Tribune.--Royal Initiative.--The Charter.--Mongrel
+Government.--Ministerial Responsibility.--Elections in
+France.--Doctrinaires.--Differences of Opinion.--Controversy.
+
+
+LETTER XX.
+
+Excursion with Lafayette.--Vincennes.--The Donjon.--Lagrange.--The
+Towers.--Interior of the House--the General's Apartments.--the Cabinet.
+--Lafayette's Title.--Church of the Chateau.--Ruins of Vivier.--Roman
+Remains.--American Curiosity.--The Table at Lagrange.--Swindling.
+
+
+LETTER XXI.
+
+Insecurity of the Bourbons.--Distrust of Americans.--Literary Visitor.
+--The Templars.--Presents and Invitations.--A Spy.--American Virtue.
+--Inconsistency.--Social Freedom in America.--French Mannerists.
+--National Distinctions.--A lively Reaction.
+
+
+LETTER XXII.
+
+Animal Magnetism.--Somnambules.--Magnetised Patients.--My own
+Examination.--A Prediction.--Ventriloquism.--Force of the Imagination.
+
+
+LETTER XXIII.
+
+Preparations for Departure.--My Consulate.--Leave
+Paris.--Picardy.--Cressy.--Montreuil.--Gate of Calais.--Port of
+Calais.--Magical Words.
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+It may seem to be late in the day to give an account of the more ordinary
+characteristics of Europe. But the mass of all nations can form their
+opinions of others through the medium of testimony only; and as no two
+travellers see precisely the same things, or, when seen, view them with
+precisely the same eyes, this is a species of writing, after all, that is
+not likely to pall, or cease to be useful. The changes that are constantly
+going on everywhere, call for as constant repetitions of the descriptions;
+and although the pictures may not always be drawn and coloured equally
+well, so long as they are taken in good faith, they will not be without
+their value.
+
+It is not a very difficult task to make what is commonly called an
+amusing book of travels. Any one who will tell, with a reasonable degree
+of graphic effect, what he has seen, will not fail to carry the reader
+with him; for the interest we all feel in personal adventure is, of
+itself, success. But it is much more difficult to give an honest and a
+discriminating summary of what one has seen. The mind so naturally turns
+to exceptions, that an observer has great need of self-distrust, of the
+powers of analysis, and, most of all, of a knowledge of the world, to be
+what the lawyers call a safe witness.
+
+I have no excuse of haste, or of a want of time, to offer for the defect
+of these volumes. All I ask is, that they may be viewed as no more than
+they profess to be. They are the _gleanings of a harvest already
+gathered_, thrown together in a desultory manner, and without the
+slightest, or, at least, very small pretensions, to any of those
+arithmetical and statistical accounts that properly belong to works of a
+graver character. They contain the passing remarks of one who has
+certainly seen something of the world, whether it has been to his
+advantage or not, who had reasonably good opportunities to examine what
+he saw, and who is not conscious of being, in the slightest degree,
+influenced "by fear, favour, or the hope of reward." His _compte rendu_
+must pass for what it is worth.
+
+
+
+
+FRANCE.
+
+
+LETTER I.
+
+Our Embarkation.--Leave-taking.--Our Abigail.--Bay of New York.
+--The Hudson.--Ominous Prediction.--The Prophet falsified.--Enter the
+Atlantic.--"Land-birds."--Our Master.--Officers of Packet-ships.
+--Loss of "The Crisis."--The "Three Chimneys."--Calamities at Sea.
+--Sailing-match.--View of the Eddystone.--The Don Quixote.
+--Comparative Sailing.--Pilot-boats.--Coast of Dorsetshire.--The Needles.
+--Lymington.--Southampton Water.--The Custom-house.
+
+
+TO CAPTAIN SHUBRICK, U.S.N.
+
+MY DEAR SHUBRICK,
+
+"Passengers by the Liverpool, London and Havre packets are informed that a
+steam-boat will leave the White Hall Wharf precisely at eleven, A.M.
+to-morrow, June 1st." If to this notice be added the year 1826, you have
+the very hour and place of our embarkation. We were nominally of the
+London party, it being our intention, however, to land at Cowes, from
+which place we proposed crossing the Channel to Havre. The reason for
+making this variation from the direct route, was the superior comfort of
+the London ship; that of the French line for the 1st June, though a good
+vessel and well commanded, being actually the least commodious packet that
+plied between the two hemispheres.
+
+We were punctual to the hour, and found one of the smaller steamers
+crowded with those who, like ourselves, were bound to the "old world," and
+the friends who had come to take the last look at them. We had our
+leave-takings, too, which are sufficiently painful when it is known that
+years must intervene before there is another meeting. As is always done by
+good Manhattanese, the town house had been given up on the 1st of May,
+since which time we had resided at an hotel. The furniture had been
+principally sold at auction, and the entire month had passed in what I
+believed to be very ample preparations. It may be questioned if there is
+any such thing as being completely prepared for so material a change; at
+all events, we found a dozen essentials neglected at the last moment, and
+as many oversights to be repaired in the same instant.
+
+On quitting the hotel, some fifty or a hundred volumes and pamphlets lay
+on the floor of my bed-room. Luckily, you were to sail on a cruise in a
+day or two, and as you promised not only to give them a berth, but to read
+them one and all, they were transferred forthwith to the Lexington. They
+were a dear gift, if you kept your word! John was sent with a note, with
+orders to be at the wharf in half an hour. I have not seen him since. Then
+Abigail was to be discharged. We had long debated whether this excellent
+woman should, or should not, be taken. She was an American, and like most
+of her countrywomen who will consent to serve in a household, a most
+valuable domestic. She wished much to go, but, on the other side, was the
+conviction, that a woman who had never been at sea would be useless during
+the passage; and then we were told so many fine things of the European
+servants, that the odds were unfortunately against her. The principal
+objection, however, was her forms of speech. Foreign servants would of
+themselves be a great aid in acquiring the different languages; and poor
+Abigail, at the best, spoke that least desirable of all corruptions of the
+English tongue, the country dialect of New England. Her New England morals
+and New England sense; in this instance, were put in the balance against
+her "bens," "_an_-gels," "doozes," "nawthings," "noans," and even her
+"virtooes," (in a family of children, no immaterial considerations,) and
+the latter prevailed. We had occasion to regret this decision. A few years
+later I met in Florence an Italian family of high rank, which had brought
+with them from Philadelphia two female domestics, whom they prized above
+all the other servants of a large establishment. Italy was not good enough
+for them, however; and, after resisting a great deal of persuasion, they
+were sent back. What was Florence or Rome to Philadelphia! But then these
+people spoke good English--better, perhaps, than common English
+nursery-maids, the greatest of their abuses in orthoepy being merely to
+teach a child to call its mother a "mare."
+
+It was a flat calm, and the packets were all dropping down the bay with
+the ebb. The day was lovely, and the view of the harbour, which _has_ so
+many, while it _wants_ so many, of the elements of first-rate scenery, was
+rarely finer. All estuaries are most beautiful viewed in the calm; but
+this is peculiarly true of the Bay of New York--neither the colour of the
+water, nor its depth, nor the height of the surrounding land, being
+favourable to the grander efforts of Nature. There is little that is
+sublime in either the Hudson, or its mouth; but there is the very extreme
+of landscape beauty.
+
+Experience will teach every one, that without returning to scenes that
+have made early impressions, after long absences, and many occasions to
+examine similar objects elsewhere, our means of comparison are of no
+great value. My acquaintance with the Hudson has been long and very
+intimate; for to say that I have gone up and down its waters a hundred
+times, would be literally much within the truth. During that journey
+whose observations and events are about to fill these volumes, I
+retained a lively impression of its scenery, and, on returning to the
+country, its current was ascended with a little apprehension that an eye
+which had got to be practised in the lights and shades of the Alps and
+Appenines might prove too fastidious for our own river. What is usually
+termed the grandeur of the highlands was certainly much impaired; but
+other parts of the scenery gained in proportion; and, on the whole, I
+found the passage between New York and Albany to be even finer than it
+had been painted by memory. I should think there can be little doubt
+that, if not positively the most beautiful river, the Hudson possesses
+some of the most beautiful river-scenery, of the known world.
+
+Our ship was named after this noble stream. We got on board of her off
+Bedlow's, and dropped quietly down as far as the quarantine ground before
+we were met by the flood. Here we came to, to wait for a wind, more
+passengers, and that important personage, whom man-of-war's men term the
+master, and landsmen the captain. In the course of the afternoon we had
+all assembled, and began to reconnoitre each other, and to attend to our
+comforts.
+
+To get accustomed to the smell of the ship, with its confined air, and
+especially to get all their little comforts about them in smooth water, is
+a good beginning for your novices. If to this be added moderation in food,
+and especially in drink; as much exercise as one can obtain; refraining
+from reading and writing until accustomed to one's situation, and paying
+great attention to the use of aperients; I believe all is said that an old
+traveller, and an old sailor too, can communicate on a subject so
+important to those who are unaccustomed to the sea. Can your experience
+suggest anything more?
+
+We lay that night at the quarantine ground; but early on the morning of
+the 2nd, all hands were called to heave-up. The wind came in puffs over
+the heights of Staten, and there was every prospect of our being able to
+get to sea in two or three hours. We hove short, and sheeted home, and
+hoisted the three topsails; but the anchor hung, and the people were
+ordered to get their breakfasts, leaving the ship to tug at her
+ground-tackle with a view to loosen her hold of the bottom.
+
+Everything was now in motion. The little Don Quixote, the Havre ship just
+mentioned, was laying through the narrows, with a fresh breeze from the
+south-west. The Liverpool ship was out of sight, and six or seven sails
+were turning down with the ebb, under every stitch of canvass that would
+draw. One fine vessel tacked directly on our quarter. As she passed quite
+near our stern, some one cried from her deck:--"A good run to you,
+Mr. ----." After thanking this well-wisher, I inquired his name. He gave me
+that of an Englishman, who resided in Cuba, whither he was bound. "How
+long do you mean to be absent?" "Five years." "You will never come back."
+With this raven-like prediction we parted; the wind sweeping his vessel
+beyond the reach of the voice.
+
+These words, "You will never come back!" were literally the last that I
+heard on quitting my country. They were uttered in a prophetic tone, and
+under circumstances that were of a nature to produce an impression. I
+thought of them often, when standing on the western verge of Europe, and
+following the course of the sun toward the land in which I was born; I
+remembered them from the peaks of the Alps, when the subtle mind,
+outstripping the senses, would make its mysterious flight westward across
+seas and oceans, to recur to the past, and to conjecture the future; and
+when the allotted five years were up, and found us still wanderers, I
+really began to think, what probably every man thinks, in some moment of
+weakness, that this call from the passing ship was meant to prepare me for
+the future. The result proved in my case, however, as it has probably
+proved in those of most men, that Providence did not consider me of
+sufficient importance to give me audible information of what was about to
+happen. So strong was this impression to the last, notwithstanding, that
+on our return, when the vessel passed the spot where the evil-omened
+prediction was uttered, I caught myself muttering involuntarily, "---- is
+a false prophet; I _have_ come back!"
+
+We got our anchor as soon as the people were ready, and, the wind drawing
+fresh through the narrows, were not long turning into lower bay. The ship
+was deep, and had not a sufficient spread of canvass for a summer passage,
+but she was well commanded, and exceedingly comfortable.
+
+The wind became light in the lower bay. The Liverpool ship had got to sea
+the evening before, and the Don Quixote was passing the Hook, just as we
+opened the mouth of the Raritan. A light English bark was making a fair
+wind of it, by laying out across the swash; and it now became questionable
+whether the ebb would last long enough to sweep us round the south-west
+spit, a _détour_ that our heavier draught rendered necessary.
+
+By paying great attention to the ship, however, the pilot, who was of the
+dilatory school, succeeded about 3 P.M. in getting us round that awkward
+but very necessary buoy, which makes so many foul winds of fair ones, when
+the ship's bead was laid to the eastward, with square yards. In half an
+hour the vessel had "slapped" past the low sandy spit of land that you
+have so often regarded with philosophical eyes, and we fairly entered the
+Atlantic, at a point where nothing but water lay between us and the Rock
+of Lisbon. We discharged the pilot on the bar.
+
+By this time the wind had entirely left us, the flood was making strong,
+and there was a prospect of our being compelled to anchor. The bark was
+nearly hull-down in the offing, and the top-gallant-sails of the Don
+Quixote were just settling into the water. All this was very provoking,
+for there might be a good breeze to seaward, while we had it calm inshore.
+The suspense was short, for a fresh-looking line along the sea to the
+southward gave notice of the approach of wind; the yards were braced
+forward, and in half an hour we were standing east southerly, with strong
+headway. About sunset we passed the light vessel which then lay moored
+several leagues from land, in the open ocean,--an experiment that has
+since failed. The highlands of Navesink disappeared with the day.
+
+The other passengers were driven below before evening. The first mate, a
+straight-forward Kennebunk man, gave me a wink, (he had detected my
+sea-education by a single expression, that of "send it an end," while
+mounting the side of the ship,) and said, "A clear quarter-deck! a good
+time to take a walk, sir." I had it all to myself, sure enough, for the
+first two or three days, after which our land-birds came crawling up, one
+by one; but long before the end of the passage nothing short of a
+double-reefed-topsail breeze could send the greater part of them below.
+There was one man, however, who, the mate affirmed wore the heel of a
+spare topmast smooth, by seating himself on it, as the precise spot where
+the motion of the ship excited the least nausea. I got into my berth at
+nine; but hearing a movement overhead about midnight, I turned out again,
+with a sense of uneasiness I had rarely before experienced at sea. The
+responsibility of a large family acted, in some measure, like the
+responsibility of command. The captain was at his post, shortening sail,
+for it blew fresher: there was some rain; and thunder and lightning were
+at work in the heavens in the direction of the adjacent continent: the air
+was full of wild, unnatural lucidity, as if the frequent flashes left a
+sort of twilight behind them; and objects were discernible at a distance
+of two or three leagues. We had been busy in the first watch, as the omens
+denoted easterly weather; the English bark was struggling along the
+troubled waters, already quite a league on our lee quarter.
+
+I remained on deck half an hour, watching the movements of the master. He
+was a mild, reasoning Connecticut man, whose manner of ministering to the
+wants of the female passengers had given me already a good opinion of his
+kindness and forethought, while it left some doubts of his ability to
+manage the rude elements of drunkenness and insubordination which existed
+among the crew, quite one half of whom were Europeans. He was now on deck
+in a southwester,[1] giving his orders in a way effectually to shake all
+that was left of the "horrors" out of the ship's company. I went below,
+satisfied that we were in good hands; and before the end of the passage, I
+was at a loss to say whether Nature had most fitted this truly worthy man
+to be a ship-master or a child's nurse, for he really appeared to me to be
+equally skilful in both capacities.
+
+[Footnote 1: Doric--_south_-wester.]
+
+Such a temperament is admirably suited to the command of a packet--a
+station in which so many different dispositions, habits and prejudices are
+to be soothed, at the same time that a proper regard is to be had to the
+safety of their persons. If any proof is wanting that the characters of
+seamen in general have been formed under adverse circumstances, and
+without sufficient attention, or, indeed, any attention to their real
+interests, it is afforded in the fact, that the officers of the
+packet-ships, men usually trained like other mariners, so easily adapt
+their habits to their new situation, and become more mild, reflecting and
+humane. It is very rare to hear a complaint against an officer of one of
+these vessels; yet it is not easy to appreciate the embarrassments they
+have frequently to encounter from whimsical, irritable, ignorant, and
+exacting passengers. As a rule, the eastern men of this country make the
+best packet-officers. They are less accustomed to sail with foreigners
+than those who have been trained in the other ports, but acquire habits of
+thought and justice by commanding their countrymen; for, of all the seamen
+of the known world, I take it the most subordinate, the least troublesome,
+and the easiest to govern, so long as he is not oppressed is the native
+American. This, indeed, is true, both ashore and afloat, for very obvious
+reasons: they who are accustomed to reason themselves, being the most
+likely to submit to reasonable regulations; and they who are habituated to
+plenty, are the least likely to be injured by prosperity, which causes
+quite as much trouble in this world as adversity. It is this prosperity,
+too suddenly acquired, which spoils most of the labouring Europeans who
+emigrate; while they seldom acquire the real, frank independence of
+feeling which characterizes the natives. They adopt an insolent and rude
+manner as its substitute, mistaking the shadow for the substance. This
+opinion of the American seamen is precisely the converse of what is
+generally believed in Europe, however, and more particularly in England;
+for, following out the one-sided political theories in which they have
+been nurtured, disorganization, in the minds of the inhabitants of the old
+world, is inseparable from popular institutions.
+
+The early part of the season of 1826 was remarkable for the quantities of
+ice that had drifted from the north into the track of European and
+American ships. The Crisis, a London packet, had been missing nearly three
+months when we sailed. She was known to have been full of passengers, and
+the worst fears were felt for her safety; ten years have since elapsed,
+and no vestige of this unhappy ship has ever been found!
+
+Our master prudently decided that safety was of much more importance than
+speed, and he kept the Hudson well to the southward. Instead of crossing
+the banks, we were as low as 40°, when in their meridian; and although we
+had some of the usual signs, in distant piles of fog, and exceedingly
+chilly and disagreeable weather, for a day or two, we saw no ice. About
+the 15th, the wind got round to the southward and eastward, and we began
+to fall off, more than we wished even, to the northward.
+
+All the charts for the last fifty years have three rocks laid down to the
+westward of Ireland, which are known as the "Three Chimneys." Most
+American mariners have little faith in their existence, and yet, I fancy,
+no seaman draws near the spot where they are said to be, without keeping a
+good look-out for the danger. The master of the Hudson once carried a
+lieutenant of the English navy, as a passenger, who assured him that he
+had actually seen these "Three Chimneys." He may have been mistaken, and
+he may not. Our course lay far to the southward of them; but the wind
+gradually hauled ahead, in such a way as to bring us as near as might be
+to the very spot where they ought to appear, if properly laid down. The
+look-outs of a merchant-ship are of no great value, except in serious
+cases, and I passed nearly a whole night on deck, quite as much incited by
+my precious charge, as by curiosity, in order to ascertain all that eyes
+could ascertain under the circumstances. No signs of these rocks, however,
+were seen from the Hudson.
+
+It is surprising in the present state of commerce, and with the vast
+interests which are at stake, that any facts affecting the ordinary
+navigation between the two hemispheres should be left in doubt. There is
+a shoal, and I believe a reef, laid down near the tail of the great
+bank, whose existence is still uncertain. Seamen respect this danger
+more than that of the "Three Chimneys," for it lies very much in the
+track of ships between Liverpool and New York; still, while tacking, or
+giving it a berth, they do not know whether they are not losing a wind
+for a groundless apprehension! Our own government would do well to
+employ a light cruiser, or two, in ascertaining just these facts (many
+more might he added to the list), during the summer months. Our own
+brief naval history is pregnant with instances of the calamities that
+befall ships. No man can say when, or how, the Insurgente, the
+Pickering, the Wasp, the Epervier, the Lynx, and the Hornet disappeared.
+We know that they are gone; and of all the brave spirits they held, not
+one has been left to relate the histories of the different disasters. We
+have some plausible conjectures concerning the manner in which the two
+latter were wrecked; but an impenetrable mystery conceals the fate of
+the four others. They may have run on unknown reefs. These reefs may be
+constantly heaving up from the depths of the ocean, by subterranean
+efforts; for a marine rock is merely the summit of a submarine
+mountain.[2]
+
+[Footnote 2: There is a touching incident connected with the fortunes of
+two young officers of the navy, that is not generally known. When the
+Essex frigate was captured in the Pacific, by the Phoebe and Cherub, two
+of the officers of the former were left in the ship, in order to make
+certain affidavits that were necessary to the condemnation. The remainder
+were paroled and returned to America. After a considerable interval, some
+uneasiness was felt at the protracted absence of those who had been left
+in the Essex. On inquiry it was found, that, after accompanying the ship
+to Rio Janeiro, they had been exchanged, according to agreement, and
+suffered to go where they pleased. After some delay, they took passage in
+a Swedish brig bound to Norway, as the only means which offered to get to
+Europe, whence they intended to return home. About this time great
+interest was also felt for the sloop Wasp. She had sailed for the mouth of
+the British Channel, where she fell in with and took the Reindeer,
+carrying her prisoners into France. Shortly after she had an action with
+and took the Avon, but was compelled to abandon her prize by others of the
+enemy's cruisers, one of which (the Castilian) actually came up with her
+and gave her a broad-side. About twenty days after the latter action she
+took a merchant-brig, near the Western Islands, and sent her into
+Philadelphia. This was the last that had been heard of her. Months and
+even years went by, and no farther intelligence was obtained. All this
+time, too, the gentlemen of the Essex were missing. Government ordered
+inquiries to be made in Sweden for the master of the brig in which they
+had embarked; he was absent on a long voyage, and a weary period elapsed
+before he could be found. When this did happen, he was required to give an
+account of his passengers. By producing his logbook and proper receipts,
+he proved that he had fallen in with the Wasp, near the line, about a
+fortnight after she had taken the merchant-brig named, when the young
+officers in question availed themselves of the occasion to return to their
+flag. Since that time, a period of twenty-one years, the Wasp has not been
+heard of.]
+
+We were eighteen days out, when, early one morning, we made an American
+ship, on our weather quarter. Both vessels had everything set that would
+draw, and were going about five knots, close on the wind. The stranger
+made a signal to speak us, and, on the Hudson's main-topsail being laid to
+the mast, he came down under our stern, and ranged up alongside to
+leeward. He proved to be a ship called the "London Packet," from
+Charlestown, bound to Havre, and his chronometer having stopped, he wanted
+to get the longitude.
+
+When we had given him our meridian, a trial of sailing commenced, which
+continued without intermission for three entire days. During this time, we
+had the wind from all quarters, and of every degree of force, from the
+lightest air to a double-reefed-topsail breeze. We were never a mile
+separated, and frequently we were for hours within a cable's length of
+each other. One night the two ships nearly got foul, in a very light air.
+The result showed, that they sailed as nearly alike, one being deep and
+the other light, as might well happen to two vessels. On the third day,
+both ships being under reefed topsails, with the wind at east, and in
+thick weather, after holding her own with us for two watches, the London
+Packet edged a little off the wind, while the Hudson still hugged it, and
+we soon lost sight of our consort in the mist.
+
+We were ten days longer struggling with adverse winds. During this time
+the ship made all possible traverses, our vigilant master resorting to
+every expedient of an experienced seaman to get to the eastward. We were
+driven up as high as fifty-four, where we fell into the track of the St.
+Lawrence traders. The sea seemed covered with them, and I believe we made
+more than a hundred, most of which were brigs. All these we passed without
+difficulty. At length a stiff breeze came from the south-west, and we laid
+our course for the mouth of the British Channel under studding-sails.
+
+On the 28th we got bottom in about sixty fathoms water. The 29th was thick
+weather, with a very light, but a fair wind; we were now quite sensibly
+within the influence of the tides. Towards evening the horizon brightened
+a little, and we made the Bill of Portland, resembling a faint bluish
+cloud. It was soon obscured, and most of the landsmen were incredulous
+about its having been seen at all. In the course of the night, however, we
+got a good view of the Eddystone.
+
+Going on deck early on the morning of the 30th, a glorious view
+presented itself. The day was fine, clear, and exhilarating, and the
+wind was blowing fresh from the westward. Ninety-seven sail, which had
+come into the Channel, like ourselves, during the thick weather, were in
+plain sight. The majority were English, but we recognized the build of
+half the maritime nations of Christendom in the brilliant fleet.
+Everybody was busy, and the blue waters were glittering with canvass. A
+frigate was in the midst of us, walking through the crowd like a giant
+stepping among pigmies. Our own good vessel left everything behind her
+also, with the exception of two or three other bright-sided ships, which
+happened to be as fast as herself.
+
+I found the master busy with the glass; and, as soon as he caught my
+eye, he made a sign for me to come forward. "Look at that ship directly
+ahead of us!" The vessel alluded to led the fleet, being nearly
+hull-down to the eastward. It was the Don Quixote, which had left the
+port of New York one month before, about the same distance in our
+advance. "Now look here, inshore of us," added the master: "it is an
+American; but I cannot make her out." "Look again: she has a new cloth
+in her main-top-gallant sail." This was true enough, and by that sign,
+the vessel was our late competitor, the London Packet!
+
+As respects the Don Quixote, we had made a journey of some five thousand
+miles, and not varied our distance, on arriving, a league. There was
+probably some accident in this; for the Don Quixote had the reputation of
+a fast ship, while the Hudson was merely a pretty fair sailer. We had
+probably got the best of the winds. But a hard and close trial of three
+days had shown that neither the Hudson nor the London Packet, in their
+present trims, could go ahead of the other in any wind. And yet here,
+after a separation of ten days, during which time our ship had tacked and
+wore fifty times, had calms, foul winds and fair, and had run fully a
+thousand miles, there was not a league's difference between the two
+vessels!
+
+I have related these circumstances, because I think they are connected
+with causes that have a great influence on the success of American
+navigation. On passing several of the British ships to-day, I observed
+that their officers were below, or at least out of sight; and in one
+instance, a vessel of a very fair mould, and with every appearance of a
+good sailer, actually lay with some of her light sails aback, long enough
+to permit us to come up with and pass her. The Hudson probably went with
+this wind some fifteen or twenty miles farther than this loiterer; while I
+much question if she could have gone as far, had the latter been well
+attended to. The secret is to be found in the fact, that so large a
+portion of American ship-masters are also ship-owners, as to have erected
+a standard of activity and vigilance, below which few are permitted to
+fall. These men work for themselves, and, like all their countrymen, are
+looking out for something more than a mere support.
+
+About noon we got a Cowes pilot. He brought no news, but told us the
+English vessel I have just named was sixty days from Leghorn, and that she
+had been once a privateer. We were just thirty from New York.
+
+We had distant glimpses of the land all day, and several of the passengers
+determined to make their way to the shore in the pilot-boat. These Channel
+craft are sloops of about thirty or forty tons, and are rather picturesque
+and pretty boats, more especially when under low sail. They are usually
+fitted to take passengers, frequently earning more in this way than by
+their pilotage. They have the long sliding bowsprit, a short lower mast,
+very long cross-trees, with a taunt topmast, and, though not so "wicked"
+to the eye, I think them prettier objects at sea than our own schooners.
+The party from the Hudson had scarcely got on board their new vessel when
+it fell calm, and the master and myself paid them a visit. They looked
+like a set of smugglers waiting for the darkness to run in. On our return
+we rowed round the ship. One cannot approach a vessel at sea, in this
+manner, without being struck with the boldness of the experiment which
+launched such massive and complicated fabrics on the ocean. The pure water
+is a medium almost as transparent as the atmosphere, and the very keel is
+seen, usually so near the surface, in consequence of refraction, as to
+give us but a very indifferent opinion of the security of the whole
+machine. I do not remember ever looking at my own vessel, when at sea,
+from a boat, without wondering at my own folly in seeking such a home.
+
+In the afternoon the breeze sprang up again, and we soon lost sight of our
+friends, who were hauling in for the still distant land. All that
+afternoon and night we had a fresh and a favourable wind. The next day I
+went on deck, while the people were washing the ship. It was Sunday, and
+there was a flat calm. The entire scene admirably suited a day of rest.
+The Channel was like a mirror, unruffled by a breath of air, and some
+twenty or thirty vessels lay scattered about the view, with their sails
+festooned and drooping, thrown into as many picturesque positions by the
+eddying waters. Our own ship had got close in with the land; so near,
+indeed, as to render a horse or a man on the shore distinctly visible. We
+were on the coast of Dorsetshire. A range of low cliffs lay directly abeam
+of us, and, as the land rose to a ridge behind them, we had a distinct
+view of a fair expanse of nearly houseless fields. We had left America
+verdant and smiling, but we found England brown and parched, there having
+been a long continuance of dry easterly winds.
+
+The cliffs terminated suddenly, a little way ahead of the ship, and the
+land retired inward, with a wide sweep, forming a large, though not a very
+deep bay, that was bounded by rather low shores. It was under these very
+cliffs, on which we were looking with so much pleasure and security, and
+at so short a distance, that the well-known and terrible wreck of an
+Indiaman occurred, when the master, with his two daughters, and hundreds
+of other lives, were lost. The pilot pointed out the precise spot where
+that ill-fated vessel went to pieces. But the sea in its anger, and the
+sea at rest, are very different powers. The place had no terrors for us.
+
+Ahead of us, near twenty miles distant, lay a high hazy bluff, that was
+just visible. This was the western extremity of the Isle of Wight, and the
+end of our passage in the Hudson. A sloop of war was pointing her head in
+towards this bluff, and all the vessels in sight now began to take new
+forms, varying and increasing the picturesque character of the view. We
+soon got a light air ourselves, and succeeded in laying the ship's head
+off shore, towards which we had been gradually drifting nearer than was
+desirable. The wind came fresh and fair about ten, when we directed our
+course towards the distant bluff. Everything was again in motion. The
+cliffs behind us gradually sunk, as those before us rose, and lost their
+indistinctness; the blue of the latter soon became grey, and, ere long,
+white as chalk, this being the material of which they are, in truth,
+composed.
+
+We saw a small whale (it might have been a large grampus) floundering
+ahead of us, and acting as an extra pilot, for he appeared to be steering,
+like ourselves, for the Needles. These Needles are fragments of the chalk
+cliffs, that have been pointed and rendered picturesque by the action of
+the weather, and our course lay directly past them. They form a line from
+the extremity of the Isle of Wight, and are awkwardly placed for vessels
+that come this way in thick weather, or in the dark. The sloop of war got
+round them first, and we were not far behind her. When fairly within the
+Needles the ship was embayed, our course now lying between Hampshire and
+the Isle of Wight, through a channel of no great width. The country was
+not particularly beautiful, and still looked parched; though we got a
+distant view of one pretty town, Lymington, in Hampshire. This place, in
+the distance, appeared not unlike a large New England village, though
+there was less glare to the houses. The cliffs, however, were very fine,
+without being of any extraordinary elevation. Though much inferior to the
+shores of the Mediterranean, they as much surpass anything I remember to
+have seen on our own coast, between Cape Anne and Cape Florida; which, for
+its extent, a part of India, perhaps, excepted, is, I take it, just the
+flattest, and tamest, and least interesting coast in the entire world.
+
+The master pointed out a mass of dark herbage on a distant height, which
+resembled a copse of wood that had been studiously clipped into square
+forms at its different angles. It was visible only for a few moments,
+through a vista in the hills. This was Carisbrooke Castle, buried in ivy.
+
+There was another little castle, on a low point of land, which was erected
+by Henry VIII. as a part of a system of marine defence. It would scarcely
+serve to scale the guns of a modern twenty-four-pounder frigate, judging
+of its means of resistance and annoyance by the eye. These things are
+by-gones for England, a country that has little need of marine batteries.
+
+About three, we reached a broad basin, the land retiring on each side of
+us. The estuary to the northward is called Southampton Water, the town of
+that name being seated on its margin. The opening in the Isle of Wight is
+little more than a very wide mouth to a very diminutive river or creek,
+and Cowes, divided into East and West, lines its shores. The anchorage in
+the arm of the sea off this little haven was well filled with vessels,
+chiefly the yachts of amateur seamen, and the port itself contained little
+more than pilot-boats and crafts of a smaller size. The Hudson brought up
+among the former. Hauling up the forecourse of a merchant-ship is like
+lifting the curtain again on the drama of the land. These vessels rarely
+furl this sail; and they who have not experienced it, cannot imagine what
+a change it produces on those who have lived a month or six weeks beneath
+its shadow. The sound of the chain running out was very grateful, and I
+believe, though well satisfied with the ship as such, that everybody was
+glad to get a nearer view of our great mother earth.
+
+It was Sunday, but we were soon visited by boats from the town. Some came
+to carry us ashore, others to see that we carried nothing off with us. At
+first, the officer of the customs manifested a desire to make us all go
+without the smallest article of dress, or anything belonging to our most
+ordinary comforts; but he listened to remonstrances, and we were
+eventually allowed to depart with our night-bags. As the Hudson was to
+sail immediately for London, all our effects were sent within the hour to
+the custom-house. At 3 P.M. July 2nd, 1826, we put foot in Europe, after a
+passage of thirty-one days from the quarantine ground.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER II.
+
+Controversy at Cowes.--Custom-house Civility.--English Costume.--Fashion
+in America.--Quadrilles in New York.--Cowes.--Nautical Gallantry.
+English Beauty.--Isle of Wight Butter.--English Scenery.--M'Adamized
+Roads.--Old Village Church.--Rural Interment.--Pauper's
+Grave.--Carisbrooke Cattle.--Southampton.--Waiter at the Vine.--English
+Costume.--Affinity with England.--Netley Abbey.--Southampton Cockneys.
+
+
+TO MRS. POMEROY, COOPERSTOWN, NEW YORK.
+
+We were no sooner on English ground, than we hurried to one of the two or
+three small inns of West Cowes, or the principal quarter of the place, and
+got rooms at the Fountain. Mr. and Mrs. ---- had preceded us, and were
+already in possession of a parlour adjoining our own. On casting an eye
+out at the street, I found them, one at each window of their own room,
+already engaged in a lively discussion of the comparative merits of Cowes
+and Philadelphia! This propensity to exaggerate the value of whatever is
+our own, and to depreciate that which is our neighbour's, a principle that
+is connected with the very ground-work of poor human nature, forms a
+material portion of travelling equipage of nearly every one who quits the
+scenes of his own youth, to visit those of other people. A comparison
+between Cowes and Philadelphia is even more absurd than a comparison
+between New York and London, and yet, in this instance, it answered the
+purpose of raising a lively controversy between an American wife and a
+European husband.
+
+The consul at Cowes had been an old acquaintance at school some
+five-and-twenty years before, and an inquiry was set on foot for his
+residence. He was absent in France, but his deputy soon presented himself
+with an offer of services. We wished for our trunks, and it was soon
+arranged that there should be an immediate examination. Within an hour we
+were summoned to the store-house, where an officer attended on behalf of
+the customs. Everything was done in a very expeditious and civil manner,
+not only for us, but for a few steerage passengers, and this, too, without
+the least necessity for a _douceur_, the usual _passe-partout_ of England.
+America sends no manufactures to Europe; and, a little smuggling in
+tobacco excepted, there is probably less of the contraband in our
+commercial connexion with England, than ever before occurred between two
+nations that have so large a trade. This, however, is only in reference to
+what goes eastward, for immense amounts of the smaller manufactured
+articles of all Europe find their way, duty free, into the United States.
+There is also a regular system of smuggling through the Canadas, I have
+been told.
+
+While the ladies were enjoying the negative luxury of being liberated from
+a ship, at the Fountain Inn, I strolled about the place. You know that I
+had twice visited England professionally before I was eighteen; and, on
+one occasion, the ship I was in anchored off this very island, though not
+at this precise spot. I now thought the people altered. There had
+certainly been so many important changes in myself during the same period,
+that it becomes me to speak with hesitation on this point: but even the
+common class seemed less peculiar, less English, _less provincial_, if one
+might use such an expression, as applied to so great a nation; in short,
+more like the rest of the world than formerly. Twenty years before,
+England was engaged in a war, by which she was, in a degree, isolated from
+most of Christendom. This insulated condition, sustained by a
+consciousness of wealth, knowledge, and power, had served to produce a
+decided peculiarity of manners, and even of appearance. In the article of
+dress I could not be mistaken. In 1806 I had seen all the lower classes of
+the English clad in something like _costumes_. The Channel waterman wore
+the short dowlas petticoat; the Thames waterman, a jacket and breeches of
+velveteen, and a badge; the gentleman and gentlewoman, attire such as was
+certainly to be seen in no other part of the Christian world, the English
+colonies excepted. Something of this still remained, but it existed rather
+as the exception than as the rule. I then felt, at every turn, that I was
+in a foreign country; whereas, now, the idea did not obtrude itself,
+unless I was brought in immediate contact with the people.
+
+America, in my time, at least, has always had an active and swift
+communication with the rest of the world. As a people, we are, beyond a
+question, decidedly provincial; but our provincialism is not exactly one
+of external appearance. The men are negligent of dress, for they are much
+occupied, have few servants, and clothes are expensive; but the women
+dress remarkably near the Parisian _modes_. We have not sufficient
+confidence in ourselves to set fashions. All our departures from the
+usages of the rest of mankind are results of circumstances, and not of
+calculation,--unless, indeed, it be one that is pecuniary. Those whose
+interest it is to produce changes cause fashions to travel fast, and there
+is not so much difficulty, or more cost, in transporting anything from
+Havre to New York, than there is in transporting the same thing from
+Calais to London; and far less difficulty in causing a new _mode_ to be
+introduced, since, as a young people, we are essentially imitative. An
+example or two will better illustrate what I mean.
+
+When I visited London, with a part of my family, in 1823, after passing
+near two years on the continent of Europe, Mrs. ---- was compelled to
+change her dress--at all times simple, but then, as a matter of course,
+Parisian--in order not to be the subject of unpleasant observation. She
+might have gone in a carriage attired as a Frenchwoman, for they who ride
+in England are not much like those who walk; but to walk in the streets,
+and look at objects, it was far pleasanter to seem English than to seem
+French. Five years later, we took London on our way to America, and even
+then something of the same necessity was felt. On reaching home, with
+dresses fresh from Paris, the same party was only in the _mode_; with
+_toilettes_ a little, and but very little, better arranged, it is true,
+but in surprising conformity with those of all around them. On visiting
+our own little retired mountain village, these Parisian-made dresses were
+scarcely the subject of remark to any but to your _connoisseurs_. My
+family struck me as being much less peculiar in the streets of C---- than
+they had been, a few months before, in the streets of London. All this
+must be explained by the activity of the intercourse between France and
+America, and by the greater facility of the Americans in submitting to the
+despotism of foreign fashions.
+
+Another fact will show you another side of the subject. While at Paris, a
+book of travels in America, written by an Englishman (Mr. Vigne), fell
+into my hands. The writer, apparently a well-disposed and sensible man,
+states that he was dancing _dos-à-dos_ in a _quadrille_, at New York, when
+he found, by the embarrassment of the rest of the set, he had done
+something wrong. Some one kindly told him that they no longer danced
+_dos-à-dos_. In commenting on this trifling circumstance, the writer
+ascribes the whole affair to the false delicacy of our women! Unable to
+see the connexion between the cause and the effect, I pointed out the
+paragraph to one of my family, who was then in the daily practice of
+dancing, and that too in Paris itself, the very court of Terpsichore. She
+laughed, and told me that the practice of dancing _dos-à-dos had gone out
+at Paris a year or two before_, and that doubtless the newer _mode_ had
+reached New York before it reached Mr. Vigne! These are trifles, but they
+are the trifles that make up the sum of national peculiarities, ignorance
+of which leads us into a thousand fruitless and absurd conjectures. In
+this little anecdote we learn the great rapidity with which new fashions
+penetrate American usages, and the greater ductility of American society
+in visible and tangible things, at least; and the heedless manner with
+which even those who write in a good spirit of America, jump to their
+conclusions. Had Captain Hall, or Mrs. Trollope, encountered this unlucky
+_quadrille_, they would probably have found some clever means of imputing
+the _nez-à-nez_ tendencies of our dances to the spirit of democracy! The
+latter, for instance, is greatly outraged by the practice of wearing hats
+in Congress, and of placing the legs on tables; and, yet, both have been
+practised in Parliament from time immemorial! She had never seen her own
+Legislature, and having a set of theories cut and dried for Congress,
+everything that struck her as novel was referred to one of her
+preconceived notions. In this manner are books manufactured, and by such
+means are nations made acquainted with each other!
+
+Cowes resembles a toy-town. The houses are tiny; the streets, in the
+main, are narrow, and not particularly straight, while everything is
+neat as wax. Some new avenues, however, are well planned, and, long ere
+this, are probably occupied; and there were several small marine villas
+in or near the place. One was shown me that belonged to the Duke of
+Norfolk. It had the outward appearance of a medium-sized American
+country-house. The bluff King Hal caused another castle to be built
+here also, which, I understood, was inhabited at the time by the family
+of the Marquis of Anglesey, who was said to be its governor. A part of
+the system of the English government patronage is connected with these
+useless castles and nominally fortified places. Salaries are attached to
+the governments, and the situations are usually bestowed on military
+men. This is a good or a bad regulation, as the patronage is used. In a
+nation of extensive military operations it might prove a commendable and
+a delicate way of rewarding services; but, as the tendency of mankind is
+to defer to intrigue, and to augment power rather than to reward merit,
+the probability is, that these places are rarely bestowed, except in the
+way of political _quids pro quos_.
+
+I was, with one striking exception, greatly disappointed in the general
+appearance of the females that I met in the streets. While strolling in
+the skirts of the town, I came across a group of girls and boys, in which
+a laughable scene of nautical gallantry was going on. The boys, lads of
+fourteen or fifteen, were young sailors, and among the girls, who were of
+the same age and class, was one of bewitching beauty. There had been some
+very palpable passages of coquetry between the two parties, when one of
+the young sailors, a tight lad of thirteen or fourteen, rushed into the
+bevy of petticoats, and, borne away by an ecstasy of admiration, but
+certainly guided by an excellent taste, he seized the young Venus round
+the neck, and dealt out some as hearty smacks as I remember to have heard.
+The working of emotion in the face of the girl was a perfect study.
+Confusion and shame came first; indignation followed; and, darting out
+from among her companions, she dealt her robust young admirer such a
+slap in the face, that it sounded like the report of a pocket-pistol.
+The blow was well meant, and admirably administered. It left the mark of
+every finger on the cheek of the sturdy little fellow. The lad clenched
+his fist, seemed much disposed to retort in kind, and ended by telling
+his beautiful antagonist that it was very fortunate for her she was not
+a boy. But it was the face of the girl herself that drew my attention.
+It was like a mirror which reflected every passing thought. When she
+gave the blow, it was red with indignation. This feeling instantly gave
+way to a kinder sentiment, and her colour softened to a flush of
+surprise at the boldness of her own act. Then came a laugh, and a look
+about her, as if to inquire if she had been very wrong; the whole
+terminating in an expression of regret in the prettiest blue eyes in the
+world, which might have satisfied any one that an offence occasioned by
+her own sweet face was not unpardonable. The sweetness, the
+ingenuousness, the spirit mingled with softness, exhibited in the
+countenance of this girl, are, I think, all characteristic of the
+English female countenance, when it has not been marble-ized by the
+over-wrought polish of high breeding. Similar countenances occur in
+America, though, I think, less frequently than here; and I believe them
+to be quite peculiar to the Anglo-Saxon race. The workings of such a
+countenance are like the play of lights and shades in a southern sky.
+
+From the windows of the inn we had a very good view of a small
+castellated dwelling that one of the King's architects had caused to be
+erected for himself. The effect of gray towers seen over the tree-tops,
+with glimpses of the lawn, visible through vistas in the copses, was
+exceedingly pretty; though the indescribable influence of association
+prevented us from paying that homage to turrets and walls of the
+nineteenth, that we were ready so devotedly to pay to anything of the
+thirteenth and fourteenth centuries.
+
+We broke bread, for the first time in Europe, that evening, having made
+an early and a hurried dinner on board the ship. The Isle of Wight is
+celebrated for its butter, and yet we found it difficult to eat it! The
+English, and many other European nations, put no salt in their table
+butter; and we, who had been accustomed to the American usage, exclaimed
+with one voice against its insipidity. A near relation of A----'s who
+once served in the British army, used to relate an anecdote on the
+subject of tastes, that is quite in point. A brother officer, who had
+gone safely through the celebrated siege of Gibraltar, landed at
+Portsmouth, on his return home. Among the other privations of his recent
+service, he had been compelled to eat butter whose fragrance scented the
+whole Rock. Before retiring for the night, he gave particular orders to
+have hot rolls and Isle of Wight butter served for breakfast. The first
+mouthful disappointed him, and of course the unlucky waiter suffered.
+The latter protested that he had executed the order to the letter. "Then
+take away your Isle of Wight butter," growled the officer, "and bring me
+some that _has a taste_."
+
+Like him of Gibraltar, we were ready to exclaim, "Take away your Isle of
+Wight butter, and bring us some from the good ship Hudson," which, though
+not quite as fragrant as that which had obtained its odour in a siege, was
+not entirely without a taste. This little event, homely as it may appear,
+is connected with the principle that influences the decisions of more than
+half of those who visit foreign nations. Usages are condemned because they
+are not our own; practices are denounced if their connexion with fitness
+is not self-apparent to our inexperience; and men and things are judged by
+rules that are of local origin and local application. The moral will be
+complete when I add, that we, who were so fastidious about the butter at
+Cowes, after an absence of nearly eight years from America, had the salt
+regularly worked out of all we ate, for months after our return home,
+protesting there was no such thing as good butter in America. Had Mrs. ----
+introduced the Philadelphia butter, however, I think her husband must have
+succumbed, for I believe it to be the best in the world, not even
+excepting that of Leyden.
+
+Towards evening, the Hudson having landed all her passengers, and the most
+of those who were in the steerage, went round the eastern point of the
+little port, on her way to London.
+
+After taking an early breakfast, we all got into a carriage called a
+sociable, which is very like a larger sort of American coaches and went to
+Newport, the principal town in the island. The road ran between hedges,
+and the scenery was strictly English. Small enclosures, copses, a sward
+clipped close as velvet, and trees (of no great size or beauty, however,)
+scattered in the fields, with an effect nearly equal to landscape
+gardening, were the predominant features. The drought had less influence
+on the verdure here than in Dorsetshire. The road was narrow and winding,
+the very _beau idéal_ of a highway; for, in this particular, the general
+rule obtains that what is agreeable is the least useful. Thanks to the
+practical good sense and perseverance of Mr. McAdam, not only the road in
+question, but nearly all the roads of Great Britain have been made, within
+the last five-and-twenty years, to resemble in appearance, but really to
+exceed in solidity and strength, the roads one formerly saw in the grounds
+of private gentlemen. These roads are almost flat, and when they have been
+properly constructed, the wheel rolls over them as if passing along a bed
+of iron. Apart from the levels, which, of course, are not so rigidly
+observed, there is not, any very sensible difference between the draught
+on a really good McAdamized road and on a railroad. We have a few roads in
+America that are nearly as good as most one meets with, but we have
+nothing that deserves to be termed a real imitation of the system of Mr.
+McAdam.
+
+The distance to Newport was only four or five miles. The town itself, a
+borough, but otherwise of little note, lies in a very sweet vale, and is
+neat but plain, resembling, in all but its greater appearance of
+antiquity and the greater size of its churches, one of our own
+provincial towns of the same size. A---- and myself took a fly, and
+went, by a very rural road, to Carisbrooke, a distance of about a mile,
+in quest of lodgings. Carisbrooke is a mere village, but the whole
+valley in this part of the island is so highly cultivated, and so many
+pretty cottages meet the eye--not cottages of the poor, but cottages of
+the rich--that it has an air of finish and high cultivation that we are
+accustomed to see only in the immediate vicinity of large towns, and not
+always even there.
+
+On reaching the hamlet of Carisbrooke we found ourselves immediately
+beneath the castle. There was a fine old village church, one of those
+picturesque rustic edifices which abound in England, a building that time
+had warped and twisted in such a way as to leave few parallel lines, or
+straight edges, or even regular angles, in any part of it. They told us,
+also, that the remains of a ruined priory were at hand. We had often
+laughed since at the eagerness and delight with which we hurried off to
+look at these venerable objects. It was soon decided, however, that it was
+a pleasure too exquisite to be niggardly enjoyed alone, and the carriage
+was sent back with orders to bring up the whole party.
+
+While the fly--a Liliputian coach drawn by a single horse, a sort of
+diminutive buggy--was absent, we went in quest of the priory. The people
+were very civil, and quite readily pointed out the way. We found the ruin
+in a farmyard. There was literally nothing but a very small fragment of a
+blind wall, but with these materials we went to work with the imagination,
+and soon completed the whole edifice. We might even have peopled it, had
+not Carisbrooke, with its keep, its gateway, and its ivy-clad ramparts,
+lain in full view, inviting us to something less ideal. The church,
+too--the rude, old, hump-backed church was already opened, waiting to be
+inspected.
+
+The interior of this building was as ancient, in appearance, at least,
+and quite as little in harmony with right lines and regular angles, as
+its exterior. All the wood-work was of unpainted oak, a colour, however,
+that was scarcely dark enough to be rich; a circumstance which, to
+American eyes, at least--eyes on whose lenses paint is ever
+present--gave it an unfinished look. Had we seen this old building five
+years later, we might have thought differently. As for the English oak,
+of which one has heard so much, it is no great matter: our own common
+oaks are much prettier, and, did we understand their beauty, there would
+not be a village church in America that, in this particular, would not
+excel the finest English cathedral. I saw nothing in all Europe, of this
+nature, that equalled the common oaken doors of the hall at C----, which
+you know so well.
+
+A movement in the church-yard called us out, and we became pained
+witnesses of the interment of two of the "unhonoured dead." The air,
+manner and conduct of these funerals made a deep impression on us both.
+The dead were a woman and a child, but of different families. There were
+three or four mourners belonging to each party. Both the bodies were
+brought in the same horse-cart, and they were buried by the same
+service. The coffins were of coarse wood, stained with black, in a way
+to betray poverty. It was literally _le convoi du pauvre_. Deference to
+their superiors, and the struggle to maintain appearances--for there was
+a semblance of the pomp of woe, even in these extraordinary groups, of
+which all were in deep mourning--contrasted strangely with the extreme
+poverty of the parties, the niggardly administration of the sacred
+offices, and the business-like manner of the whole _transaction_. The
+mourners evidently struggled between natural grief and the bewilderment
+of their situation. The clergyman was a good-looking young man, in a
+dirty surplice. Most probably he was a curate. He read the service in a
+strong voice, but without reverence, and as if he were doing it by the
+job. In every way short measure was dealt out to the poor mourners. When
+the solemn words of "dust to dust, ashes to ashes," were uttered, he
+bowed hastily towards each grave--he stood between them--and the
+assistants met his wholesale administration of the rites with a
+wholesale sympathy.
+
+The ceremony was no sooner over, than the clergyman and his clerk retired
+into the church. One or two of the men cast wistful eyes towards the
+graves, neither of which was half filled, and reluctantly followed. I
+could scarcely believe my senses, and ventured to approach the door. Here
+I met such a view as I had never before seen, and hope never to witness
+again. On one side of me two men were filling the graves; on the opposite,
+two others were actually paying the funeral fees. In one ear was the
+hollow sound of the clod on the coffin; in the other the chinking of
+silver on the altar! Yea, literally on the altar! We are certainly far
+behind this great people in many essential particulars; our manners are
+less formed; our civilization is less perfect; but, thanks to the spirit
+which led our ancestors into the wilderness! such mockery of the Almighty
+and his worship, such a mingling of God and Mammon, never yet disgraced
+the temple within the wide reach of the American borders.
+
+We were joined by the whole party before the sods were laid on the graves
+of the poor; but some time after the silver had been given for the
+consolations of religion. With melancholy reflections we mounted to the
+castle. A---- had been educated in opinions peculiarly favourable to
+England; but I saw, as we walked mournfully away from the spot, that one
+fact like this did more to remove the film from her eyes, than volumes of
+reading.
+
+Carisbrooke has been too often described to need many words. Externally,
+it is a pile of high battlemented wall, completely buried in ivy, forming
+within a large area, that was once subdivided into courts, of which
+however, there are, at present, scarcely any remains. We found an old
+woman as warder, who occupied a room or two in a sort of cottage that had
+been made out of the ruins. The part of the edifice which had been the
+prison of Charles I. was a total ruin, resembling any ordinary house,
+without roof, floors, or chimneys. The aperture of the window through
+which he attempted to escape is still visible. It is in the outer wall,
+against which the principal apartments had been erected. The whole work
+stands on a high irregular ridge of a rocky hill, the keep being much the
+most elevated. We ascended to the sort of bastion which its summit forms,
+whence the view was charming. The whole vale, which contains Carisbrooke
+and Newport, with a multitude of cottages, villas, farm-houses and
+orchards, with meads, lawns and shrubberies, lay in full view, and we had
+distant glimpses of the water. The setting of this sweet picture, or the
+adjacent hills, was as naked and brown as the vale itself was crowded with
+objects and verdant. The Isle of Wight, as a whole, did not strike me as
+being either particularly fertile or particularly beautiful, while it
+contains certain spots that are eminently both. I have sailed entirely
+round it more than once, and, judging from the appearance of its coasts,
+and from what was visible in this little excursion, I should think that it
+had more than a usual amount of waste treeless land. The sea-views are
+fine, as a matter of course, and the air is pure and bracing. It is
+consequently much frequented in summer. It were better to call it the
+"watering-place," than to call it the "garden" of England.
+
+We had come in quest of a house where the family might be left, for a few
+days, while I went up to London. But the whole party was anxious to put
+their feet in _bona fide_ old England before they crossed the Channel, and
+the plan was changed to meet their wishes. We slept that night at Newport,
+therefore, and returned in the morning to Cowes, early enough to get on
+board a steam-boat for Southampton. This town lies several miles up an
+estuary that receives one or two small streams. There are a few dwellings
+on the banks of the latter, that are about the size and of the appearance
+of the better sort of country-houses on the Hudson, although more
+attention appears to have been generally paid to the grounds. There were
+two more of Henry the Eighth's forts; and we caught a glimpse of a fine
+ruined Gothic window in passing Netley Abbey.
+
+We landed on the pier at Southampton about one, and found ourselves truly
+in England. "Boat, sir, boat?" "Coach, sir, coach?" "London, sir,
+London?"--"No; we have need of neither!"--"Thank'ee, sir--thank'ee, sir."
+These few words, in one sense, are an epitome of England. They rang in our
+ears for the first five minutes after landing. Pressing forward for a
+livelihood, a multitude of conveniences, a choice of amusements, and a
+trained, but a heartless and unmeaning civility. "No; I do not want a
+boat." "Thank'ee, sir." You are just as much "thank'ee" if you do not
+employ the man as if you did. You are thanked for condescending to give an
+order, for declining, for listening. It is plain to see that such thanks
+dwell only on the lips. And yet we so easily get to be sophisticated;
+words can be so readily made to supplant things; deference, however
+unmeaning, is usually so grateful, that one soon becomes accustomed to all
+this, and even begins to complain that he is not imposed on.
+
+We turned into the first clean-looking inn that offered. It was called the
+Vine, and though a second-rate house, for Southampton even, we were
+sufficiently well served. Everything was neat, and the waiter, an old man
+with a powdered bead, was as methodical as a clock, and a most busy
+servitor to human wants. He told me he had been twenty-eight years doing
+exactly the same things daily, and in precisely the same place. Think of a
+man crying "Coming, sir," and setting table, for a whole life, within an
+area of forty feet square! Truly, this was not America.
+
+The principal street in Southampton, though making a sweep, is a broad,
+clean avenue, that is lined with houses having, with very few exceptions,
+bow-windows, as far as an ancient gate, a part of the old defences of the
+town. Here the High-street is divided into "Above-bar" and "Below-bar".
+The former is much the most modern, and promises to be an exceedingly
+pretty place when a little more advanced. "Below-bar" is neat and
+agreeable too. The people appeared singularly well dressed, after New
+York. The women, though less fashionably attired than our own, taking the
+Paris modes for the criterion, were in beautiful English chintzes,
+spotlessly neat, and the men all looked as if they had been born with
+hat-brushes and clothes-brushes in their hands, and yet every one was in a
+sort of seashore _costume_. I saw many men whom my nautical instinct
+detected at once to be naval officers,--some of whom must have been
+captains,--in round-abouts; but it was quite impossible to criticise
+toilettes that were so faultlessly neat, and so perfectly well arranged.
+
+We ordered dinner, and sallied forth in quest of lodgings. Southampton is
+said to be peculiar for "long passages, bow-windows, and old maids." I can
+vouch that it merits the two first distinctions. The season had scarcely
+commenced, and we had little difficulty in obtaining rooms, the bow-window
+and long passage included. These lodgings comprise one or more
+drawing-rooms, the requisite number of bed-rooms, and the use of the
+kitchen. The people of the house, ordinarily tradespeople, do the cooking
+and furnish the necessary attendance. We engaged an extra servant, and
+prepared to take possession that evening.
+
+When we returned to the Vine, we found a visitor in this land of
+strangers. Mrs. R----, of New York, a relative and an old friend, had
+heard that Americans of our name were there, and she came doubting and
+hoping to the Vine. We found that the windows of our own drawing-room
+looked directly into those of hers. A few doors below us dwelt Mrs. L----,
+a still nearer relative; and a few days later, we had _vis-à-vis_, Mrs.
+M'A----, a sister of A----'s, on whom we all laid eyes for the first time
+in our lives! Such little incidents recall to mind the close
+consanguinity of the two nations; although for myself, I have always
+felt as a stranger in England. This has not been so much from the want
+of kindness and a community of opinion many subjects, as from a
+consciousness, that in the whole of that great nation, there is not a
+single individual with whom I could claim affinity. And yet, with a
+slight exception, we are purely of English extraction. Our father was
+the great-great-grandson of an Englishman. I once met with a man, (an
+Englishman,) who bore so strong a resemblance to him, in stature, form,
+walk, features and expression, that I actually took the trouble to
+ascertain his name. He even had our own. I had no means of tracing the
+matter any farther; but here was physical evidence to show the affinity
+between the two people. On the other hand, A---- comes of the Huguenots.
+She is purely American by every intermarriage, from the time of Louis
+the Fourteenth down, and yet she found cousins in England at every turn,
+and even a child of the same parents, who was as much of an Englishwoman
+as she herself was an American.
+
+We drank to the happiness of America, at dinner. That day, fifty years,
+she declared herself a nation; that very day, and nearly at that hour,
+two of the co-labourers in the great work we celebrated, departed in
+company for the world of spirits!
+
+A day or two was necessary to become familiarized to the novel objects
+around us, and my departure for London was postponed. We profited by the
+delay, to visit Netley Abbey, a ruin of some note, at no great distance
+from Southampton. The road was circuitous, and we passed several pretty
+country-houses, few of which exceeded in size or embellishments,
+shrubbery excepted, similar dwellings at home. There was one, however,
+of an architecture much more ancient than we had been accustomed to see,
+it being, by all appearance, of the time of Elizabeth or James. It had
+turrets and battlements, but was otherwise plain.
+
+The abbey was a fine, without being a very imposing, ruin, standing in the
+midst of a field of English neatness, prettily relieved by woods. The
+window already mentioned formed the finest part. The effect of these ruins
+on us proved the wonderful power of association. The greater force of the
+past than of the future on the mind, can only be the result of
+questionable causes. Our real concern with the future is incalculably the
+greatest, and yet we are dreaming over our own graves, on the events and
+scenes which throw a charm around the graves of those who have gone before
+us! Had we seen Netley Abbey, just as far advanced towards completion, as
+it was, in fact, advanced towards decay, our speculations would have been
+limited by a few conjectures on its probable appearance; but gazing at it
+as we did, we peopled its passages, imagined Benedictines stalking along
+its galleries, and fancied that we heard the voices of the choir, pealing
+among its arches.
+
+Our fresh American feelings were strangely interrupted by the sounds of
+junketing. A party of Southampton cockneys, (there are cockneys even in
+New York,) having established themselves on the grass, in one of the
+courts, were lighting a fire, and were deliberately proceeding to make
+tea! "To tea, and ruins," the invitations most probably run. We
+retreated into a little battery of the bluff King Hal, that was near by,
+a work that sufficiently proved the state of nautical warfare in the
+sixteenth century.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER III.
+
+Road to London.--Royal Pastime.--Cockney Coachman.--Winchester Assizes.
+--Approach to London.--The Parks.--Piccadilly.--Street Excursion.
+--Strangers in London.--Americans in England.--Westminster Abbey.
+--Gothic Decorations.--Westminster Hall.--Inquisitive Barber.--Pasta
+and Malibran.--Drury-lane Theatre.--A Pickpocket.--A Fellow-traveller.
+--English Gentlemen.--A Radical.--Encampment of Gipsies.--National
+Distinctions.--Antiquities.--National Peculiarities.
+
+
+To R. COOPER, ESQ. COOPERSTOWN.
+
+At a very early hour one of the London coaches stopped at the door. I had
+secured a seat by the side of the coachman, and we went through the "bar"
+at a round trot. The distance was about sixty miles, and I had paid a
+guinea for my place. There were four or five other passengers, all on the
+outside.
+
+The road between Southampton and London is one of little interest; even
+the highway itself is not as good as usual, for the first twenty or thirty
+miles, being made chiefly of gravel, instead of broken stones. The soil
+for a long distance was thirsty, and the verdure was nearly gone. England
+feels a drought sooner than most countries, probably from the
+circumstances of its vegetation being so little accustomed to the absence
+of moisture, and to the comparative lightness of the dews. The winds,
+until just before the arrival of the Hudson, had been blowing from the
+eastward for several weeks, and in England this is usually a dry wind. The
+roads were dusty, the hedges were brown, and the fields had nothing to
+boast of over our own verdure. Indeed, it is unusual to see the grasses
+of New York so much discoloured, so early in the season.
+
+I soon established amicable relations with my companion on the box. He had
+been ordered at the Vine to stop for an American, and he soon began to
+converse about the new world. "Is America anywhere near Van Diemen's
+Land?" was one of his first questions. I satisfied him on this head, and
+he apologised for the mistake, by explaining that he had a sister settled
+in Van Diemen's Land, and he had a natural desire to know something about
+her welfare! We passed a house which had more the air of a considerable
+place than any I had yet seen, though of far less architectural
+pretensions than the miniature castle near Cowes. This, my companion
+informed me, had once been occupied by George IV. when Prince of Wales.
+"Here his Royal Highness enjoyed what I call the perfection of life, sir;
+women, wine, and fox-hunting!" added the professor of the whip, with the
+leer of a true amateur.
+
+These coachmen are a class by themselves. They have no concern with
+grooming the horses, and keep the reins for a certain number of relays.
+They dress in a particular way, without being at all in livery or
+uniform, like the continental postilions, talk in a particular way, and
+act in a particular way. We changed this personage for another, about
+half the distance between Southampton and London. His successor proved
+to be even a still better specimen of his class. He was a thorough
+cockney, and altogether the superior of his country colleague, he was
+clearly the oracle of the boys, delivering his sentiments in the manner
+of one accustomed to dictate to all in and about the stables. In
+addition to this, there was an indescribable, but ludicrous salvo to his
+dignity, in the way of surliness. Some one had engaged him to carry a
+blackbird to town, and caused him to wait. On this subject he sang a
+Jeremiad in the true cockney key. "He didn't want to _take_ the
+_bla-a-a-ck-bud_; but if the man wanted to _send_ the _bla-a-a-ck-bud_,
+why didn't he _bring_ the _bla-a-a-ck-bud_?" This is one of the hundred
+dialects of the lower classes of the English. One of the horses of the
+last team was restiff, and it became necessary to restrain him by an
+additional curb before we ventured into the streets of London. I
+intimated that I had known such horses completely subdued in America by
+filling their ears with cotton. This suggestion evidently gave offence,
+and he took occasion soon after to show it. He wrung the nose of the
+horse with a cord, attaching its end below, in the manner of a severe
+martingale. While going through this harsh process, which, by the way,
+effectually subdued the animal, he had leisure to tell him that "he was
+an _English_ horse, and not an _out-landish_ horse, and _he_ knew best
+what was good for him," with a great deal more similar sound
+nationality.
+
+Winchester was the only town of any importance on the road. It is
+pleasantly seated in a valley, is of no great size, is but meanly built,
+though extremely neat, has a cathedral and a bishop, and is the shire-town
+of Hampshire. The assizes were sitting, and Southampton was full of troops
+that had been sent from Winchester, in order to comply with a custom which
+forbids the military to remain near the courts of justice. England is full
+of these political mystifications, and it is one of the reasons that she
+is so much in arrears in many of the great essentials. In carrying out the
+practice in this identical case, a serious private wrong was inflicted, in
+order that, in form, an abstract and perfectly useless principle might be
+maintained. The inns at Southampton were filled with troops, who were
+billeted on the publicans, will ye, nill ye; and not only the masters of
+the different houses, but travellers were subjected to a great
+inconvenience, in order that this abstraction might not be violated. There
+may be some small remuneration, but no one can suppose for a moment, that
+the keeper of a genteel establishment of this nature wishes to see his
+carriage-houses, gateways, and halls thronged with soldiers. Society
+oppresses him to maintain appearances! At the present day the presence of
+soldiers might be the means of sustaining justice, while there is not the
+smallest probability that they would be used for contrary purposes, except
+in cases in which this usage or law--for I believe there is a statue for
+it--would not be in the least respected. This is not an age, nor is
+England the country, in which a judge is to be overawed by the roll of a
+drum. All sacrifices of common sense, and all recourse to plausible
+political combinations, whether of individuals or of men, are uniformly
+made at the expense of the majority. The day is certainly arrived when
+absurdities like these should be done away with.
+
+The weather was oppressively hot, nor do I remember to have suffered more
+from the sun than during this little journey. Were I to indulge in the
+traveller's propensity to refer everything to his own state of feeling,
+you might be told what a sultry place England is in July. But I was too
+old a sailor not to understand the cause. The sea is always more temperate
+than the land, being cooler in summer and warmer in winter. After being
+thirty days at sea, we all feel this truth, either in one way or the
+other. I was quitting the coast, too, which is uniformly cooler than the
+interior.
+
+When some twelve or thirteen miles from town, the coachman pointed to a
+wood enclosed by a wall, on our left. A rill trickled from the thicket,
+and ran beneath the road. I was told that Virginia Water lay there, and
+that the evening before a single footpad had robbed a coach in that
+precise spot, or within a few hundred yards of the very place where the
+King of England at the moment was amusing himself with the fishing-rod.
+Highway robberies, however are now of exceedingly rare occurrence, that in
+question being spoken of as the only one within the knowledge of my
+informant for many years.
+
+Our rate of travelling was much the same as that of one of our own better
+sort of stages. The distance was not materially less than that between
+Albany and C----n; the roads were not so hilly, and much better than our
+own road; and yet, at the same season, we usually perform it in about the
+same time that we went the distance between Southampton and London. The
+scenery was tame, nor, with the exception of Winchester, was there a
+single object of any interest visible until we got near London. We crossed
+the Thames, a stream of trifling expanse, and at Kew we had a glimpse of
+an old German-looking edifice in yellow bricks, with towers, turrets, and
+battlements. This was one of the royal palaces. It stood on the opposite
+side of the river, in the midst of tolerably extensive grounds. Here a
+nearly incessant stream of vehicles commenced. I attempted to count the
+stage-coaches, and got as high as thirty-three, when we met a line of
+mail-coaches, that caused me to stop in despair. I think we met not less
+than fifty within the last hour of our journey. There were seven belonging
+to the mail in one group. They all leave London at the same hour, for
+different parts of the kingdom.
+
+At Hyde Park Corner I began to recall objects known in my early visits
+to London. Apsley House had changed owners, and had become the property
+of one whose great name was still in the germ, when I had last seen his
+present dwelling. The Parks, a gateway or two excepted, were unchanged.
+In the row of noble houses that line Piccadilly--in that
+hospital-looking edifice, Devonshire House--in the dingy, mean,
+irregular, and yet interesting front of St. James's--in Brookes's,
+White's, the Thatched House, and various other historical _monuments_, I
+saw no change. Buckingham House had disappeared, and an unintelligible
+pile was rising on its ruins. A noble "_palazzo-non-finito_" stood at
+the angle between the Green and St. James's Parks, and here and there I
+discovered houses of better architecture than London was wont of old to
+boast. One of the very best of these, I was told, was raised in honour
+of Mercury, and probably out of his legitimate profits. It is called
+Crockford's.
+
+Our "_bla-a-a-ck-bud_" pulled up in the Strand, at the head of
+Adam-street, Adelphi, and I descended from my seat at his side. An extra
+shilling brought the glimmering of a surly smile athwart his
+blubber-cheeks, and we parted in good-humour. My fellow-travellers were
+all men of no very high class, but they had been civil, and were
+sufficiently attentive to my wants, when they found I was a stranger, by
+pointing out objects on the road, and explaining the usages of the inns.
+One of them had been in America, and he boasted a little of his intimacy
+with General This and Commodore That. At one time, too, he appeared
+somewhat disposed to institute comparisons between the two countries, a
+good deal at our expense, as you may suppose; but as I made no answers,
+I soon heard him settling it with his companions, that, after all, it
+was quite natural a man should not like to hear his own country abused;
+and so he gave the matter up. With this exception, I had no cause of
+complaint, but, on the contrary, good reason to be pleased.
+
+I was set down at the Adam-street Hotel, a house much frequented by
+Americans. The respectable woman who has so long kept it received me
+with quiet civility, saw that I had a room, and promised me a dinner in
+a few minutes. While the latter was preparing, having got rid of the
+dust, I went out into the streets. The lamps were just lighted, and I
+went swiftly along the Strand, recalling objects at every step. In this
+manner I passed, at a rapid pace, Somerset House, St. Clement's-le-Dane,
+St. Mary-le-Strand, Temple-bar, Bridge-street, Ludgate-hill, pausing
+only before St. Paul's. Along the whole of this line I saw but little
+change. A grand bridge, Waterloo, with a noble approach to it, had been
+thrown across the river just above Somerset House, but nearly everything
+else remained unaltered. I believe my manner, and the eagerness with
+which I gazed at long-remembered objects, attracted attention; for I
+soon observed I was dogged around the church by a suspicious-looking
+fellow. He either suspected me of evil, or, attracted by my want of a
+London air, he meditated evil himself. Knowing my own innocence, I
+determined to bring the matter to an issue. We were alone, in a retired
+part of the place, and, first making sure that my watch, wallet, and
+handkerchief had not already disappeared, I walked directly up to him,
+and looked him intently in the face, as if to recognize his features. He
+took the hint, and, turning on his heels, moved nimbly of. It is
+surprising how soon an accustomed eye will distinguish a stranger in the
+streets of a large town. On mentioning this circumstance next day
+to ----, he said that the Londoners pretend to recognize a rustic air in
+a countess, if she has been six months from town. Rusticity in such
+cases, however, must merely mean a little behind the fashions.
+
+I had suffered curiosity to draw me two miles from my dinner, and was as
+glad to get back as just before I had been to run away from it. Still
+the past, with the recollections which crowded on the mind, bringing
+with them a flood of all sorts of associations, prevented me from
+getting into a coach, which would, in a measure, have excluded objects
+from my sight. I went to bed that night with the strange sensation of
+being again in London, after an interval of twenty years.
+
+The next day I set about the business which had brought me to the
+English capital. Most of our passengers were in town, and we met, as a
+matter of course. I had calls from three or four Americans established
+here, some in one capacity, and some in others; for our country has long
+been giving back its increase to England, in the shape of admirals,
+generals, judges, artists, writers and _notion-mongers_. But what is all
+this compared to the constant accessions of Europeans among ourselves?
+Eight years later, on returning home, I found New York, in feeling,
+opinions, desires, (apart from profit,) and I might almost say, in
+population, a foreign rather than American town.
+
+I had passed months in London when a boy, and yet had no knowledge of
+Westminster Abbey! I cannot account for this oversight, for I was a great
+devotee of Gothic architecture, of which, by the way, I knew nothing,
+except through the prints; and I could not reproach myself with a want of
+proper curiosity on such subjects, for I had devoted as much time to their
+examination as my duty to the ship would at all allow. Still, all I could
+recall of the abbey was an indistinct image of two towers, with a glimpse
+in at a great door. Now that I was master of my own movements, one of my
+first acts was to hurry to the venerable church.
+
+Westminster Abbey is built in the form of a cross, as is, I believe,
+invariably the case with every Catholic church of any pretension. At its
+northern end are two towers, and at its southern is the celebrated chapel
+of Henry VII. This chapel is an addition, which, allowing for a vast
+difference in the scale, resembles, in its general appearance, a school,
+or vestry-room, attached to the end of one of our own churches. A Gothic
+church is, indeed, seldom complete without such a chapel. It is not an
+easy matter to impress an American with a proper idea of European
+architecture. Even while the edifice is before his eyes, he is very apt to
+form an erroneous opinion of its comparative magnitude. The proportions
+aid deception in the first place, and absence uniformly exaggerates the
+beauty and extent of familiar objects. None but those who have disciplined
+the eye, and who have accustomed themselves to measure proportions by
+rules more definite than those of the fancy, should trust to their
+judgments in descriptions of this sort.
+
+Westminster itself is not large, however, in comparison with St. Paul's,
+and an ordinary parish church, called St. Margaret's, which must be, I
+think, quite as large as Trinity, New York, and stands within a hundred
+yards of the abbey, is but a pigmy compared with Westminster. I took a
+position in St. Margaret's church-yard, at a point where the whole of the
+eastern side of the edifice might be seen, and for the first time in my
+life gazed upon a truly Gothic structure of any magnitude. It was near
+sunset, and the light was peculiarly suited to the sombre architecture.
+The material was a grey stone, that time had rendered dull, and which had
+broad shades of black about its angles and faces. That of the chapel was
+fresher, and of a warmer tint; a change well suited to the greater
+delicacy of the ornaments.
+
+The principal building is in the severer style of the Gothic, without,
+however, being one of its best specimens. It is comparatively plain, nor
+are the proportions faultless. The towers are twins, are far from being
+high, and to me they have since seemed to have a crowded appearance, or to
+be too near each other; a defect that sensibly lessens the grandeur of the
+north front. A few feet, more or less, in such a case, may carry the
+architect too much without, or too much within, the just proportions. I
+lay claim to very little science on the subject, but I have frequently
+observed since, that, to my own eye, (and the uninitiated can have no
+other criterion,) these towers, as seen from the parks, above the tops of
+the trees, have a contracted and pinched air.
+
+But while the abbey church itself is as plain as almost any similar
+edifice I remember, its great extent, and the noble windows and doors,
+rendered it to me deeply impressive. On the other hand, the chapel is an
+exquisite specimen of the most elaborated ornaments of the style. All
+sorts of monstrosities have, at one period or another, been pressed into
+the service of the Gothic, such as lizards, toads, frogs, serpents,
+dragons, spitfires, and salamanders. There is, I believe, some typical
+connexion between these offensive objects and the different sins. When
+well carved, properly placed, and not viewed too near, their effect is far
+from bad. They help to give the edifice its fretted appearance, or a look
+resembling that of lace. Various other features, which have been taken
+from familiar objects, such as parts of castellated buildings,
+portcullises, and armorial bearings, help to make up the sum of the
+detail. On Henry the Seventh's chapel, toads, lizards, and the whole group
+of metaphorical sins are sufficiently numerous, without being offensively
+apparent; while miniature portcullises, escutcheons, and other ornaments,
+give the whole the rich and imaginative--almost fairy-like aspect,--which
+forms the distinctive feature of the most ornamented portions of the
+order. You have seen ivory work-boxes from the East, that were cut and
+carved in a way to render them so very complicated, delicate, and
+beautiful, that they please us without conveying any fixed forms to the
+mind. It would be no great departure from literal truth, were I to bid you
+fancy one of these boxes swelled to the dimensions of a church, the
+material changed to stone, and, after a due allowance for a difference in
+form, for the painted windows, and for the emblems, were I to add, that
+such a box would probably give you the best idea of a highly-wrought
+Gothic edifice, that any comparison of the sort can furnish.
+
+I stood gazing at the pile, until I felt the sensation we term "a
+creeping of the blood." I know that Westminster, though remarkable for
+its chapel, was, by no means, a first-rate specimen of its own style of
+architecture; and, at that moment, a journey through Europe promised to
+be a gradation of enjoyments, each more exquisite than the other. All
+the architecture of America united, would not assemble a tithe of the
+grandeur, the fanciful, or of the beautiful, (a few imitations of
+Grecian temples excepted,) that were to be seen in this single edifice.
+If I were to enumerate the strong and excited feelings which are
+awakened by viewing novel objects, I should place this short visit to
+the abbey as giving birth in me to sensation No. 1. The emotion of a
+first landing in Europe had long passed; our recent "land-fall" had been
+like any other "land-fall," merely pleasant; and I even looked upon St.
+Paul's as an old and a rather familiar friend. This was absolutely my
+introduction to the Gothic, and it has proved to be an acquaintance
+pregnant of more satisfaction than any other it has been my good fortune
+to make since youth.
+
+It was too late to enter the church, and I turned away towards the
+adjoining public buildings. The English kings had a palace at Westminster,
+in the times of the Plantagenets. It was the ancient usage to assemble the
+parliament, which was little more than a _lit de justice_ previously to
+the struggle which terminated in the commonwealth, in the royal residence,
+and, in this manner, Westminster Palace became, permanently, the place for
+holding the meetings of these bodies. The buildings, ancient and modern,
+form a cluster on the banks of the river, and are separated from the abbey
+by a street. I believe their site was once an island.
+
+Westminster Hall was built as the banqueting room of the palace. There is
+no uniformity in the architecture of the pile, which is exceedingly
+complicated and confused. My examination, at this time, was too hurried
+for details; and I shall refer you to a later visit to England for a
+description. A vacant space at the abbey end of the palace is called Old
+Palace-yard, which sufficiently indicates the locality of the ancient
+royal residence; and a similar, but larger space or square, at the
+entrance to the hall, is known as New Palace-yard. Two sides of the latter
+are filled with the buildings of the pile; namely, the courts of law, the
+principal part of the hall, and certain houses that are occupied by some
+of the minor functionaries of the establishment, with buildings to contain
+records, etc. The latter are mean, and altogether unworthy of the
+neighbourhood. They were plastered on the exterior, and observing a hole
+in the mortar, I approached and found to my surprise, that here, in the
+heart of the English capital, as a part of the legislative and judicial
+structures, in plain view, and on the most frequented square of the
+vicinity, were houses actually built of wood, and covered with lath and
+mortar!
+
+The next morning I sent for a hair-dresser. As he entered the room I made
+him a sign, without speaking, to cut my hair. I was reading the morning
+paper, and my operator had got half through with his job, without a
+syllable being exchanged between us, when the man of the comb suddenly
+demanded, "What is the reason, sir, that the Americans think everything in
+their own country so much better than it is everywhere else?" You will
+suppose that the _brusquerie_, as well as the purport of this
+interrogatory, occasioned some surprise. How he knew I was an American at
+all I am unable to say, but the fellow had been fidgeting the whole time
+to break out upon me with this question.
+
+I mention the anecdote, in order to show you how lively and general the
+feeling of jealousy has got to be among our transatlantic kinsmen. There
+will be a better occasion to speak of this hereafter.
+
+London was empty. The fashionable streets were actually without a soul,
+for minutes at a time; and, without seeing it, I could not have believed
+that a town which, at certain times, is so crowded as actually to render
+crossing its streets hazardous, was ever so like a mere wilderness of
+houses. During these recesses in dissipation and fashion, I believe that
+the meanest residents disappear for a few months.
+
+Our fellow-traveller, Mr. L----, however, was in London, and we passed a
+day or two in company. As he is a votary of music, he took me to hear
+Madame Pasta. I was nearly as much struck with the extent and magnificence
+of the Opera-house, as I had been with the architecture of the Abbey. The
+brilliant manner in which it was lighted, in particular, excited my
+admiration, for want of light is a decided and a prominent fault of all
+scenic exhibitions at home, whether they are made in public or in private.
+Madame Pasta played _Semiramide_ "How do you like her?" demanded L----, at
+the close of the first act. "Extremely; I scarce know which to praise the
+most, the command and the range of her voice, or her powers as a mere
+actress. But, don't you think her exceedingly like the _Signorina?_" The
+present Madame Malibran was then singing in New York, under the name of
+Signorina Garcia. L---- laughed, and told me the remark was well enough,
+but I had not put the question in exactly the proper form. "Do you not
+think the Signorina exceedingly like Madame Pasta?" would have been
+better. I had got the matter wrong end foremost.
+
+L---- reminded me of our having amused ourselves on the passage with the
+nasal tones of the chorus at New York. He now directed my attention to
+the same peculiarity here. In this particular I saw no difference; nor
+should there be any, for I believe nearly all who are on the American
+stage, in any character, are foreigners, and chiefly English.
+
+The next day we went to old Drury, where we found a countryman, and
+townsman, Mr. Stephen Price, in the chair of Sheridan. The season was
+over, but we were shown the whole of the interior. It is also a
+magnificent structure in extent and internal embellishment, though a
+very plain brick pile externally. It must have eight or ten times the
+cubic contents of the largest American theatre. The rival building,
+Covent Garden, is within a few hundred feet of it, and has much more of
+architectural pretension, though neither can lay claim to much. The
+taste of the latter is very well, but it is built of that penny-saving
+material, stuccoed bricks.
+
+We dined with Mr. Price, and on the table was some of our own
+justly-celebrated Madeira. L----, who is an oracle on these subjects,
+pronounced it injured. He was told it was so lately arrived from New York,
+that there had not been time to affect it. This fact, coupled with others
+that have since come to my knowledge, induce me to believe that the change
+of tastes, which is so often remarked in liquors, fruits, and other
+eatables, is as much wrought on ourselves, as in the much-abused viands.
+Those delicate organs which are necessary to this particular sense may
+readily undergo modifications by the varieties of temperature. We know
+that taste and its sister sense, smelling, are both temporarily destroyed
+by colds. The voice is signally affected by temperature. In cold climates
+it is clear and soft; in warm, harsh and deep. All these facts would serve
+to sustain the probability of the theory that a large portion of the
+strictures that are lavished on the products of different countries,
+should be lavished on our own capricious organs. _Au reste_, the
+consequence is much the same, let the cause be what it will.
+
+Mr. M----, an Englishman, who has many business concerns with America,
+came in while we were still at table, and I quitted the house in his
+company. It was still broad daylight. As we were walking together, arm and
+arm, my companion suddenly placed a hand behind him, and said, "My fine
+fellow, you are there, are you?" A lad of about seventeen had a hand in
+one of his pockets, feeling for his handkerchief. The case was perfectly
+clear, for Mr. M---- had him still in his gripe when I saw them. Instead
+of showing apprehension or shame, the fellow began to bluster and
+threaten. My companion, after a word or two of advice, hurried me from the
+spot. On expressing the surprise I felt at his permitting such a hardened
+rogue to go at large, he said that our wisest course was to get away. The
+lad was evidently supported by a gang, and we might be beaten as well as
+robbed, for our pains. Besides, the handkerchief was not actually taken,
+attendance in the courts was both expensive and vexatious, and he would be
+bound over to prosecute. In England, the complainant is compelled to
+prosecute, which is, in effect, a premium on crime! We retain many of the
+absurdities of the common law, and, among others, some which depend on a
+distinction between the intention and the commission of the act; but I do
+not know that any of our States are so unjust as to punish a citizen, in
+this way, because he has already been the victim of a rogue.
+
+After all, I am not so certain our law is much better; but I believe more
+of the _onus_ of obtaining justice falls on the injured party here than it
+does with us: still we are both too much under the dominion of the common
+law.
+
+The next day I was looking at a bronze statue of Achilles, at Hyde Park
+Corner, which had been erected in honour of the Duke of Wellington. The
+place, like every other fashionable haunt at that season, was
+comparatively deserted. Still, there might have been fifty persons in
+sight. "Stop him! stop him!" cried a man, who was chasing another directly
+towards me. The chase, to use nautical terms, began to lighten ship by
+throwing overboard first one article and then another. As these objects
+were cast in different directions, he probably hoped that his pursuer,
+like Atalantis, might stop to pick them up. The last that appeared in the
+air was a hat, when, finding himself hemmed in between three of us, the
+thief suffered himself to be taken. A young man had been sleeping on the
+grass, and this land-pirate had absolutely succeeded in getting his shoes,
+his handkerchief, and his hat; but an attempt to _take off his cravat_ had
+awoke the sleeper. In this case, the prisoner was marched off under sundry
+severe threats of vengeance; for the _robbee_ was heated with the run, and
+really looked so ridiculous that his anger was quite natural.
+
+My business was now done, and I left London in a night-coach for
+Southampton. The place of rendezvous was the White Horse Cellar, in
+Piccadilly--a spot almost as celebrated for those who are _in transitu_,
+as was the Isthmus of Suez of old. I took an inside seat this time, for
+the convenience of a nap. At first, I had but a single fellow-traveller.
+Venturing to ask him the names of one or two objects that we passed, and
+fearing he might think my curiosity impertinent, I apologized for it, by
+mentioning that I was a foreigner. "A foreigner!" he exclaimed; "why,
+you speak English as well as I do myself!" I confess I had thought,
+until that moment, that the advantage, in this particular, was
+altogether on my side; but it seems I was mistaken. By way of relieving
+his mind, however, I told him I was an American. "An American!" and he
+seemed more puzzled than ever. After a few minutes of meditation on what
+he had just heard, he civilly pointed to a bit of meadow through which
+the Thames meanders, and good-naturedly told me it was Runnymeade. I
+presume my manner denoted a proper interest, for he now took up the
+subject of the English Barons, and entered into a long account of their
+modern magnificence and wealth. This is a topic that a large class in
+England, who only know their aristocracy by report, usually discuss with
+great unction. They appear to have the same pride in the superiority of
+their great families, that the American slave is known to feel in the
+importance of his master. I say this seriously, and not with a view to
+sneer, but to point out to you a state of feeling that, at first, struck
+me as very extraordinary. I suppose that the feelings of both castes
+depend on a very natural principle. The Englishman, however, as he is
+better educated, has one respectable feature in his deference. He exults
+with reason in the superiority of his betters over the betters of most
+other people: in this particular he is fully borne out by the fact.
+Subsequent observation has given me occasion to observe, that the
+English gentleman, in appearance, attainments, manliness, and perhaps I
+might add, principles, although this and deportment are points on which
+I should speak with less confidence, stands at the head of his class in
+Christendom. This should not be, nor would it be, were the gentlemen of
+America equal to their fortunes, which, unhappily, they are not. Facts
+have so far preceded opinions at home, as to leave but few minds capable
+of keeping in their company. But this is a subject to which we may also
+have occasion to return.
+
+The coach stopped, and we took up a third inside. This man proved to be
+a radical. He soon began to make side-hits at the "nobility and gentry,"
+and, mingled with some biting truths, he uttered a vast deal of
+nonsense. While he was in the midst of his denunciations, the coach
+again stopped, and one of the outsides was driven into it by the night
+air. He was evidently a gentleman, and the guard afterwards told me he
+was a Captain Somebody, and a nephew of a Lord Something, to whose
+country place he was going. The appearance of the captain checked the
+radical for a little while; but, finding that the other was quiet, he
+soon returned to the attack. The aristocrat was silent, and the admirer
+of aristocracy evidently thought himself too good to enter into a
+dispute with one of the mere people; for _to admire_ aristocracy was, in
+his eyes, something like an _illustration_; but wincing under one of the
+other's home-pushes, he said, "These opinions may do very well for this
+gentleman," meaning me, who as yet had not uttered a syllable--"who is
+an American; but I must say, I think them out of place in the mouth of
+an Englishman." The radical regarded me a moment, and inquired if what
+the other had just said was true. I answered that it was. He then began
+an eulogium on America; which, like his Jeremiad on England, had a good
+many truths blended with a great deal of nonsense. At length, he
+unfortunately referred to me, to corroborate one of his most capital
+errors. As this could not be done conscientiously, for his theory
+depended on the material misconstruction of giving the whole legislative
+power to Congress, I was obliged to explain the mistake into which he
+had fallen. The captain and the _toady_ were both evidently pleased; nor
+can I say, I was sorry the appeal had been made, for it had the effect
+of silencing a commentator, who knew very little of his subject. The
+captain manifested his satisfaction, by commencing a conversation, which
+lasted until we all went to sleep. Both the captain and the radical
+quitted us in the night.
+
+Men like the one just described do the truth a great deal of harm. Their
+knowledge does not extend to first principles, and they are always for
+maintaining their positions by a citation of facts. One half of the latter
+are imagined; and even that which is true is so enveloped with collateral
+absurdities, that when pushed, they are invariably exposed. These are the
+travellers who come among us Liberals, and go back Tories. Finding that
+things fall short of the political Elysiums of their imaginations, they
+fly into the opposite extreme, as a sort of _amende honorable_ to their
+own folly and ignorance.
+
+At the distance of a few miles from Winchester, we passed an encampment of
+gipsies, by the way-side. They were better-looking than I had expected to
+see them, though their faces were hardly perceptible in the grey of the
+morning. They appeared well fed and very comfortably bivouacked. Why do
+not these people appear in America? or, do they come, and get absorbed,
+like all the rest, by the humane and popular tendencies of the country?
+What a homage will it be to the institutions, if it be found that even a
+gipsy cease to be a gipsy in such a country! Just as the sun rose, I got
+out to our lodgings and went to bed.
+
+After a sound sleep of two or three hours, I rose and went to the
+drawing-room. A lady was in it, seated in a way to allow me to see no
+more than a small part of her side-face. In that little, I saw the
+countenance of your aunt's family. It was the sister whom we had never
+seen, and who had hastened out of Hertfordshire to meet us. There are
+obvious reasons why such a subject cannot be treated in this letter, but
+the study of two sisters who had been educated, the one in England and
+the other in America, who possessed so much in common, and yet, who were
+separated by so much that was not in common, was to me a matter of
+singular interest. It showed me, at a glance, the manner in which the
+distinctive moral and physical features of nations are formed; the
+points of resemblance being just sufficient to render the points of
+difference more obvious.
+
+A new and nearer route to Netley had been discovered during my absence,
+and our unpractised Americans had done little else than admire ruins for
+the past week. The European who comes to America plunges into the virgin
+forest with wonder and delight; while the American who goes to Europe
+finds his greatest pleasure, at first, in hunting up the memorials of the
+past. Each is in quest of novelty, and is burning with the desire to gaze
+at objects of which he has often read.
+
+The steam-boat made but one or two voyages a week between Southampton
+and Havre, and we were obliged to wait a day or two for the next trip.
+The intervening time was passed in the manner just named. Every place of
+any importance in England has some work or other written on the subject
+of its history, its beauties, and its monuments. It is lucky to escape a
+folio. Our works on Southampton, (which are of moderate dimensions,
+however,) spoke of some Roman remains in the neighbourhood. The spot was
+found, and, although the imagination was of greater use than common in
+following the author's description, we stood on the spot with a species
+of antiquarian awe.
+
+Southampton had formerly been a port of some importance. Many of the
+expeditions sent against France embarked here, and the town had once
+been well fortified, for the warfare of the period. A good deal of the
+old wall remains. All of this was industriously traced out; while the
+bow-windows, long passages, and old maids, found no favour in our eyes.
+
+One simple and touching memorial I well remember. There is a ferry
+between the town and the grounds near Netley Abbey. A lady had caught a
+cold, which terminated in death, in consequence of waiting on the shore,
+during a storm, for the arrival of a boat. To protect others from a
+similar calamity, she had ordered a very suitable defence against the
+weather to be built on the fatal spot, and to be kept in repair for
+ever. The structure is entirely of stone, small and exceedingly simple
+and ingenious. The ground plan is that of a Greek cross. On this
+foundation are reared four walls, which, of course, cross each other in
+the centre at right angles. A little above the height of a man, the
+whole is amply roofed. Let the wind blow which way it will, you perceive
+there is always shelter. There is no external wall, and the diameter of
+the whole does not exceed ten feet, if it be as much. This little work
+is exceedingly English, and it is just as unlike anything American as
+possible. It has its origin in benevolence, is original in the idea, and
+it is picturesque. We might accomplish the benevolence, but it would be
+of a more public character: the picturesque is a thing of which we
+hardly know the meaning; and as for the originality, the dread of doing
+anything different from his neighbour would effectually prevent an
+American from erecting such a shelter; even charity with us being
+subject to the control of the general voice. On the other hand, what a
+clever expedient would have been devised, in the first instance, in
+America, to get across the ferry without taking cold! All these little
+peculiarities have an intimate connexion with national character and
+national habits. The desire to be independent and original causes a
+multitude of silly things to be invented here, while the apprehension of
+doing anything different from those around them causes a multitude of
+silly things to be _perpetuated_ in America; and yet we are children of
+the same parents! When profit is in view, we have but one soul and that
+is certainly inventive enough; but when money has been made, and is to
+be spent, we really do not seem to know how to set about it, except by
+routine.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER IV.
+
+Quit England.--Approach to France.--Havre.--Our Reception there.--Female
+Commissionnaire.--Clamour of Drums.--Port of Havre.--Projected
+Enterprize.--American Enterprize.--Steam-boat
+Excursion.--Honfleur.--Rouen.--French Exaction.--American
+Porters.--Rouen Cathedral.--Our Cicerone.--A Diligence.--Picturesque
+Road.--European Peasantry.--Aspect of the Country.--Church at
+Louviers.--Village near Vernon.--Rosny.--Mantes.--Bourbon Magnificence.
+--Approach to Paris--Enter Paris.
+
+
+To R. COOPER, ESQ., COOPERSTOWN.
+
+On quitting England, we embarked from the very strand where Henry V.
+embarked for the fruitless field of Agincourt. A fearful rumour had gone
+abroad that the Camilla (the steam-boat) had been shorn of a wing, and
+there were many rueful faces in the boat that took us off to the vessel.
+In plainer speech, one of the boilers was out of order, and the passage
+was to be made with just half the usual propelling power. At that
+season, or indeed at any season, the only probable consequence was loss
+of time. With a strong head-wind, it is true, the Camilla might have
+been compelled to return; but this might also have happened with the use
+of both the boilers.
+
+Our adventurers did not see things in this light. The division of
+employments, which produces prices so cheap and good, makes bad
+travellers. Our boat's cargo embarked with fear and trembling, and "She
+has but one boiler!" passed from mouth to mouth amid ominous faces. A
+bachelor-looking personage, of about fifty, with his person well
+swaddled in July, declared in a loud voice, that we were "all going on
+board to be drowned." This startled A----, who, having full faith in my
+nautical experience, asked what we were to think of it? It was a mere
+question between ten hours and fifteen, and so I told her. The females,
+who had just before been trembling with alarm, brightened at this, and
+two or three of them civilly thanked me for the information they had
+thus obtained incidentally!--"Boat, sir! boat!" "Thank 'ee, sir; thank
+'ee, sir."
+
+We found two or three parties on board of a higher condition than
+common. Apprehension cast a shade over the cold marble-like polish of
+even the English aristocrat; for if, as Mrs. Opie has well observed,
+there is nothing "so like a lord in a passion as a commoner in a
+passion," "your fear" is also a sad leveller. The boat was soon under
+way, and gradually our cargo of mental apprehensions settled into the
+usual dolorous physical suffering of landsmen in rough water. So much
+for excessive civilization. The want of a boiler under similar
+circumstances, would have excited no feeling whatever among a similar
+number of Americans, nineteen in twenty of whom, thanks to their
+rough-and-tumble habits, would know exactly what to think of it.
+
+I was seated, during a part of the day, near a group of young men, who
+were conversing with a lady of some three or four and twenty. They
+expressed their surprise at meeting her on board. She told them it was a
+sudden whim; that no one knew of her movements; she meant only to be gone
+a fortnight, to take a run into Normandy. In the course of the
+conversation I learned that she was single, and had a maid and a footman
+with her. In this guise she might go where she pleased; whereas, had she
+taken "an escort" in the American fashion, her character would have
+suffered. This usage, however, is English rather than European. Single
+women on the Continent, except in extraordinary cases, are obliged to
+maintain far greater reserve even than with us; and there, single or
+married, they cannot travel under the protection of any man who is not
+very nearly connected with them, domestics and dependants excepted.
+
+The debates about proceeding at all had detained us so long, and the
+"one boiler" proved to be so powerless, that night set in, and we had
+not yet made the coast of France. The breeze had been fresh, but it
+lulled towards sunset, though not before we began to feel the influence
+of the tides. About midnight, however, I heard some one exclaim, "Land!"
+and we all hastened on deck, to take a first look at France.
+
+The boat was running along beneath some cliffs. The moon was shining
+bright, and her rays lighted up the chalky sides of the high coast,
+giving them a ghostly hue. The towers of two lighthouses also glittered
+on a headland near by. Presently a long sea-wall became visible, and,
+rounding its end, we shot into smooth water. We entered the little port
+of Havre between artificial works, on one of which stands a low,
+massive, circular tower, that tradition attributes to no less a
+personage than Julius Caesar.
+
+What a change in so short a time! On the other side of the Channel,
+beyond the usual demands for employment, which were made in a modest
+way, and the eternal "Thank'ee, sir," there was a quiet in the people
+that was not entirely free from a suspicion of surliness. Here every man
+seemed to have two voices, both of which he used as if with no other
+desire than to hear himself speak. Notwithstanding the hour, which was
+past midnight, the quay was well lined, and a dozen officials poured on
+board the boat to prevent our landing. Custom-house officers, gendarmes,
+with enormous hats, and female commissionaires, were counteracting each
+other at every turn. At length we were permitted to land, being ordered
+up to a building near by. Here the females were taken into a separate
+room, where their persons were examined by functionaries of their own
+sex for contraband goods! This process has been described to me as being
+to the last degree offensive and humiliating. My own person was
+respected, I know not, why, for we were herded like sheep. As we were
+without spot, at least so far as smuggling was concerned, we were soon
+liberated. All our effects were left in the office, and we were turned
+into the streets without even a rag but what we had on. This was an
+inauspicious commencement for a country so polished; and yet, when one
+comes to look at the causes, it is not easy to point out an alternative.
+It was our own fault that we came so late.
+
+The streets were empty, and the tall grey houses, narrow avenues, and
+the unaccustomed objects, presented a strange spectacle by the placid
+light of the moon. It appeared as if we had alighted in a different
+planet. Though fatigued and sleepy, the whole party would involuntarily
+stop to admire some novelty, and our march was straggling and irregular.
+One house refused us after another, and it soon became seriously a
+question whether the night was not to be passed in the open air. P----
+was less than three years old, and as we had a regular gradation from
+that age upward, our _début_ in France promised to be anything but
+agreeable. The guide said his resources were exhausted, and hinted at
+the impossibility of getting in. Nothing but the inns was open, and at
+all these we were refused. At length I remembered that, in poring over
+an English guide-book, purchased in New York, a certain Hôtel
+d'Angleterre had been recommended as the best house in Havre.
+"Savez-vous, mon ami, où est l'Hôtel d'Angleterre?"--"Ma fois, oui;
+c'est tout près." This "ma fois, oui," was ominous, and the "c'est tout,
+près," was more so still. Thither we went, however, and we were
+received. Then commenced the process of climbing. We ascended several
+stories, by a narrow crooked staircase, and were shown into rooms on the
+fifth floor.
+
+The floors were of waxed tiles, without carpets or mats, and the
+furniture was tawdry. We got into our beds, which fatigue could scarcely
+render it possible to endure, on account of the bugs. A more infernal
+night I never passed, and I have often thought since, how hazardous it
+is to trust to first impressions. This night, and one or two more passed
+at Havre, and one other passed between Rouen and Paris, were among the
+most uncomfortable I can remember; and yet if I were to name a country
+in which one would be the most certain to get a good and a clean bed, I
+think I should name France!
+
+The next morning I arose and went down the ladder, for it was little
+better, to the lower world. The servant wished to know if we intended to
+use the _table d'hôte_, which he pronounced excellent. Curiosity induced
+me to look at the appliances. It was a dark, dirty and crowded room, and
+yet not without certain savoury smells. French cookery can even get the
+better of French dirt. It was the only place about the house, the kitchen
+excepted, where a tolerable smell was to be found, and I mounted to the
+upper regions in self-defence.
+
+An hour or two afterwards, the consul did me the favour to call. I
+apologized for the necessity of causing him to clamber up so high. "It
+is not a misfortune here," was the answer, "for the higher one is, the
+purer is the atmosphere;" and he was right enough. It was not necessary
+to explain that we were in an inferior house, and certainly everything
+was extremely novel. At breakfast, however, there was a sensible
+improvement. The linen was white as snow; we were served with silver
+forks--it was a breakfast _à la fourchette_--spotlessly clean napkins,
+excellent rolls, and delicious butter, to say nothing of _côtelettes_
+that appeared to have been cooked by magic. Your aunt and myself looked
+at each other with ludicrous satisfaction when we came to taste coffee,
+which happened to be precisely at the same instant. It was the first
+time either of us had ever tasted French coffee--it would scarcely be
+exaggeration to say, that either of us had ever tasted coffee at all. I
+have had many French cooks since; have lived years in the capital of
+France itself, but I could never yet obtain a servant who understood the
+secret of making _café au lait_, as it is made in most of the inns and
+_cafés_ of that country. The discrepancy between the excellence of the
+table and the abominations of the place struck them all, so forcibly,
+that the rest of the party did little else but talk about it. As for
+myself, I wished to do nothing but eat.
+
+I had now another specimen of national manners. It was necessary to get
+our luggage through the custom-house. The consul recommended a
+_commissionnaire_ to help me. "You are not to be surprised," he said,
+laughing, as he went away, "if I send you one in petticoats." In a few
+minutes, sure enough, one of the _beau sexe_ presented herself. Her name
+was Désirée, and an abler negotiator was never employed. She scolded,
+coaxed, advised, wrangled, and uniformly triumphed. The officers were
+more civil, by daylight, than we had found them under the influence of
+the moon, and our business was soon effected.
+
+W---- had brought with him a spy-glass. It was old and of little value,
+but it was an heir-loom of the family. It came from the Hall at C----n,
+and had become historical for its service in detecting deer, in the
+lake, during the early years of the settlement. This glass had
+disappeared. No inquiry could recover it. "Send for Désirée," said the
+consul. Désirée came, received her orders, and in half an hour the glass
+was restored. There was an oversight in not getting a passport, when we
+were about to quit Havre. The office hours were over, and the steam-boat
+could not wait. "Were is Désirée?" Désirée was made acquainted with the
+difficulty, and the passport was obtained. "Désirée, où est Désirée?"
+cried some one in the crowd, that had assembled to see the Camilla start
+for England, the day after our arrival. "Here is an Englishman who is
+too late to get his passport _viséd_," said this person to Désirée, so
+near me that I heard it all; "the boat goes in ten minutes--what is to
+be done?"--"_Ma foi_--it is too late!" "Try, _ma bonne_--it's a pity he
+should lose his passage--_voici_." The Englishman gave his fee. Désirée
+looked about her, and then taking the idler by the arm, she hurried him
+through the crowd, this way and that way, ending by putting him aboard
+without any passport at all. "It is too late to get one," she said; "and
+they can but send you back." He passed undetected. France has a plenty
+of these managing females, though Désirée is one of the cleverest of
+them all. I understood this woman had passed a year or two in England,
+expressly to fit herself for her present occupation, by learning the
+language.
+
+While engaged in taking our passages on board the steam-boat for Rouen,
+some one called me by name, in English. The sound of the most familiar
+words, in one's own language, soon get to be startling in a foreign
+country. I remember, on returning to England, after an absence of five
+years, that it was more than a week before I could persuade myself I was
+not addressed whenever a passer-by spoke suddenly. On the present
+occasion, I was called to by an old schoolboy acquaintance, Mr. H----r,
+who was a consul in England, but who had taken a house on what is called
+the _Côte_, a hill-side, just above Ingouville, a village at no great
+distance from the town. We went out to his pretty little cottage, which
+enjoyed a charming view. Indeed I should particularize this spot as the
+one which gave me the first idea of one species of distinctive European
+scenery. The houses cling to the declivity, rising above each other in a
+way that might literally enable one to toss a stone into his neighbour's
+chimney-top. They are of stone, but being whitewashed, and very
+numerous, they give the whole mountain-side the appearance of a pretty
+hamlet, scattered without order in the midst of gardens. Italy abounds
+with such little scenes; nor are they unfrequent in France, especially
+in the vicinity of towns; though whitened edifices are far from being
+the prevailing taste of that country.
+
+That evening we had an infernal clamour of drums in the principal street,
+which happened to be our own. There might have been fifty, unaccompanied
+by any wind instrument. The French do not use the fife, and when one is
+treated to the drum, it is generally in large potions, and nothing but
+drum. This is a relic of barbarism, and is quite unworthy of a musical
+age. There is more or less of it in all the garrisoned towns of Europe.
+You may imagine the satisfaction with which one listens to a hundred or
+two of these plaintive instruments, beat between houses six or eight
+stories high, in a narrow street, and with desperate perseverance! The
+object is to recall the troops to their quarters.
+
+Havre is a tide-harbour. In America, where there is, on an average, not
+more than five feet of rise and fall to the water of the sea, such a
+haven would, of course, be impracticable for large vessels. But the
+majority of the ports on the British Channel are of this character, and
+indeed a large portion of the harbours of Great Britain. Calais,
+Boulogne, Havre, and Dieppe, are all inaccessible at low water. The
+cliffs are broken by a large ravine, a creek makes up the gorge, or a
+small stream flows outward into the sea, a basin is excavated, the
+entrance is rendered safe by moles which project into deep water, and
+the town is crowded around this semi-artificial port as well as
+circumstances will allow. Such is, more or less, the history of them
+all. Havre, however, is in some measure an exception. It stands on a
+plain, that I should think had once been a marsh. The cliffs are near
+it, seaward, and towards the interior there are fine receding hills,
+leaving a sufficient site, notwithstanding, for a town of large
+dimensions.
+
+The port of Havre has been much improved of late years. Large basins have
+been excavated, and formed into regular wet docks. They are nearly in the
+centre of the town. The mole stretches out several hundred yards on that
+side of the entrance of the port which is next the sea. Here signals are
+regularly made to acquaint vessels in the offing with the precise number
+of feet that can be brought into the port. These signals are changed at
+the rise or fall of every foot, according to a graduated scale which is
+near the signal pole. At dead low water the entrance to the harbour, and
+the outer harbour itself, are merely beds of soft mud. Machines are kept
+constantly at work to deepen them.
+
+The ship from sea makes the lights, and judges of the state of the tide
+by the signals. She rounds the Mole-Head at the distance of fifty or
+sixty yards, and sails along a passage too narrow to admit another
+vessel, at the same moment, into the harbour. Here she finds from
+eighteen to twenty, or even twenty-four feet of water, according to
+circumstances. She is hauled up to the gates of a dock, which are opened
+at high water only. As the water falls, one gate is shut, and the
+entrance to the dock becomes a lock: vessels can enter, therefore, as
+long as there remains sufficient water in the outer harbour for a ship
+to float. If caught outside, however, she must lie in the mud until the
+ensuing tide.
+
+Havre is the sea-port of Paris, and is rapidly increasing in importance.
+There is a project for connecting the latter with the sea by a ship
+channel. Such a project is hardly suited to the French impulses, which
+imagine a thousand grand projects, but hardly ever convert any of them
+to much practical good. The opinions of the people are formed on habits
+of great saving, and it requires older calculations, greater familiarity
+with risks, and more liberal notions of industry, and, possibly, more
+capital than is commonly found in their enterprises, to induce the
+people to encounter the extra charges of these improvements, when they
+can have recourse to what, in their eyes, are simpler and safer means of
+making money. The government employs men of science, who conceive well;
+but their conceptions are but indifferently sustained by the average
+practical intellect of the country. In this particular France is the
+very converse of America.
+
+The project of making a sea-port of Paris, is founded on a principle
+that is radically wrong. It is easier to build a house on the sea-side,
+than to carry the sea into the interior. But the political economy of
+France, like that of nearly all the continental nations, is based on a
+false principle, that of forcing improvements. The intellects of the
+mass should first be acted on, and when the public mind is sufficiently
+improved to benefit by innovations, the public sentiment might be
+trusted to decide the questions of locality and usefulness. The French
+system looks to a concentration of everything in Paris. The political
+organization of the country favours such a scheme, and in a project of
+this sort, the interests of all the northern and western departments
+would be sacrificed to the interests of Paris. As for the departments
+east and south of Paris, they would in no degree be benefited by making
+a port of Paris, as goods would still have to be transshipped to reach
+them. A system of canals and railroads is much wanted in France, and
+most of all, a system of general instruction, to prepare the minds of
+the operatives to profit by such advantages. When I say that we are
+behind our facts in America, I do not mean in a physical, but in a moral
+sense. All that is visible and tangible is led by opinion; in all that
+is purely moral, the facts precede the notions of the people.
+
+I found, at a later day, many droll theories broached in France, more
+especially in the Chamber of Deputies, on the subject of our own great
+success in the useful enterprises. As is usual, in such cases, any
+reason but the true one was given. At the period of our arrival in
+Europe, the plan of connecting the great lakes with the Atlantic had
+just been completed, and the vast results were beginning to attract
+attention in Europe. At first, it was thought, as a matter of course,
+that engineers from the old world had been employed. This was disproved,
+and it was shown that they who laid out the work, however skilful they
+may have since become by practice, were at first little more than common
+American surveyors. Then the trifling cost was a stumbling-block, for
+labour was known to be far better paid in America than in Europe; and
+lastly, the results created astonishment. Several deputies affirmed that
+the cause of the great success was owing to the fact, that in America we
+trusted such things to private competition, whereas, in France, the
+government meddled with everything. But it was the state governments,
+(which indeed alone possess the necessary means and authority,) that had
+caused most of the American canals to be constructed. These political
+economists knew too little of other systems to apply a clever saying of
+their own--_Il y a de la Rochefoucald, et de la Rouchefoucald_. All
+governments do not wither what they touch.
+
+Some Americans have introduced steam-boats on the rivers of France, and
+on the lakes of Switzerland and Italy. We embarked in one, after passing
+two delectable nights at the Hôtel d'Angleterre. The boat was a
+frail-looking thing, and so loaded with passengers, that it appeared
+actually to stagger under its freight. The Seine has a wide mouth, and a
+long ground-swell was setting in from the Channel. Our Parisian
+cockneys, of whom there were several on board, stood aghast. "Nous voici
+en pleine mer!" one muttered to the other, and the annals of that
+eventful voyage are still related, I make no question, to admiring
+auditors in the interior of France. The French make excellent seamen
+when properly trained; but I think, on the whole, they are more
+thoroughly landsmen than any people of my acquaintance, who possess a
+coast. There has been too much sympathy with the army to permit the
+mariners to receive a proper share of the public favour.
+
+The boat shaped her course diagonally across the broad current, directly
+for Honfleur. Here we first began to get an idea of the true points of
+difference between our own scenery and that of the continent of Europe,
+and chiefly of that of France. The general characteristics of England
+are not essentially different from those of America, after allowing for
+a much higher finish in the former, substituting hedges for fences, and
+stripping the earth of its forests. These, you may think, are, in
+themselves, grand points of difference, but they fall far short of those
+which render the continent of Europe altogether of a different nature.
+Of forest, there is vastly more in France than in England. But, with few
+exceptions, the fields are not separated by enclosures. The houses are
+of stone, or of wood, rough-cast. Honfleur, as we approached, had a grey
+distinctness that is difficult to describe. The atmosphere seemed
+visible, around the angles of the buildings, as in certain Flemish
+pictures, bringing out the fine old sombre piles from the depth of the
+view, in a way to leave little concealed, while nothing was meretricious
+or gaudy. At first, though we found these hues imposing, and even
+beautiful, we thought the view would have been gayer and more agreeable,
+had the tints been livelier; but a little use taught us that our tastes
+had been corrupted. On our return home every structure appeared flaring
+and tawdry. Even those of stone had a recent and mushroom air, besides
+being in colours equally ill suited to architecture or a landscape. The
+only thing of the sort in America which appeared venerable and of a
+suitable hue, after an absence of eight years, was our own family abode,
+and this, the despoiler, paint, had not defiled for near forty years.
+
+We discharged part of our cargo at Honfleur, but the boat was still
+greatly crowded. Fatigue and ill health rendered standing painful to
+A----, and all the benches were crowded. She approached a young girl of
+about eighteen, who occupied _three chairs_. On one she was seated; on
+another she had her feet; and the third held her _reticule_. Apologizing
+for the liberty, A---- asked leave to put the _reticule_ on the second
+chair, and to take the third for her own use. This request was refused!
+The selfishness created by sophistication and a factitious state of
+things renders such acts quite frequent, for it is more my wish to offer
+you distinctive traits of character than exceptions. This case of
+selfishness might have been a little stronger than usual, it is true,
+but similar acts are of daily occurrence, _out of society_, in France.
+_In society_, the utmost respect to the wants and feelings of others is
+paid, vastly more than with us; while, with us, it is scarcely too
+strong to say that such an instance of unfeeling selfishness could
+scarcely have occurred at all. We may have occasion to inquire into the
+causes of this difference in national manners hereafter.
+
+The Seine narrows at Quilleboeuf, about thirty miles from Havre, to the
+width of an ordinary European tide river. On a high bluff we passed a
+ruin, called _Tancarville_, which was formerly a castle of the De
+Montmorencies. This place was the cradle of one of William's barons; and
+an English descendant, I believe, has been ennobled by the title of Earl
+of Tankerville.
+
+Above Quilleboeuf the river becomes exceedingly pretty. It is crooked, a
+charm in itself, has many willowy islands, and here and there a grey
+venerable town is seated in the opening of the high hills which contract
+the view, with crumbling towers, and walls that did good service in the
+times of the old English and French wars. There were fewer seats than
+might have been expected, though we passed three or four. One near the
+waterside, of some size, was in the ancient French style, with avenues
+cut in formal lines, mutilated statues, precise and treeless terraces,
+and other elaborated monstrosities. These places are not entirely
+without a pretension to magnificence; but, considered in reference to
+what is desirable in landscape gardening, they are the very _laid idéal_
+of deformity. After winding our way for eight or ten hours amid such
+scenes, the towers of Rouen came in view. They had a dark ebony-coloured
+look, which did great violence to our Manhattanese notions, but which
+harmonized gloriously with a bluish sky, the grey walls beneath, and a
+background of hanging fields.
+
+Rouen is a sea-port; vessels of two hundred, or two hundred and fifty
+tons burden, lying at its quays. Here is also a custom-house, and our
+baggage was again opened for examination. This was done amid a great
+deal of noise and confusion, and yet so cursorily as to be of no real
+service. At Havre, landing as we did in the night, and committing all to
+Désirée the next day, I escaped collision with subordinates. But, not
+having a servant, I was now compelled to look after our effects in
+person. W---- protested that we had fallen among barbarians; what
+between brawls, contests for the trunks, cries, oaths, and snatching,
+the scene was equally provoking and comic.
+
+Without schooling, without training of any sort, little checked by
+morals, pressed upon by society, with nearly every necessary of life
+highly taxed, and yet entirely loosened from the deference of feudal
+manners, the Frenchmen of this class have, in general, become what they
+who wish to ride upon their fellow mortals love to represent them as
+being, truculent, violent, greedy of gain, and but too much disposed to
+exaction. There is great _bonhomie_ and many touches of chivalry in the
+national character; but it is asking too much to suppose that men who
+are placed in the situation I have named, should not exhibit some of the
+most unpleasant traits of human infirmity. Our trunks were put into a
+handbarrow, and wheeled by two men a few hundred yards, the whole
+occupying half an hour of time. For this service ten francs were
+demanded. I offered five, or double what would have been required by a
+drayman in New York, a place where labour is proverbially dear. This was
+disdainfully refused, and I was threatened with the law. Of the latter I
+knew nothing; but, determined not to be bullied into what I felt
+persuaded was an imposition, I threw down the five francs and walked
+away. These fellows kept prowling about the hotel the whole day,
+alternately wheedling and menacing, without success. Towards night one
+of them appeared, and returned the five francs, saying, that he gave me
+his services for nothing. I thanked him, and put the money in my pocket.
+This fit of dignity lasted about five minutes, when, as _finale_, I
+received a proposal to pay the money again, and bring the matter to a
+close, which was done accordingly.
+
+An Englishman of the same class would have done his work in silence,
+with a respect approaching to servility, and with a system that any
+little _contretems_ would derange. He would ask enough, take his money
+with a "thank 'ee, sir," and go off looking as surly as if he were
+dissatisfied. An American would do his work silently, but independently
+as to manner--but a fact will best illustrate the conduct of the
+American. The day after we landed at New-York, I returned to the ship
+for the light articles. They made a troublesome load, and filled a
+horse-cart. "What do you think I _ought_ to get for carrying this load,
+'sqire?" asked the cartman, as he looked at the baskets, umbrellas,
+band-boxes, valises, secretaries, trunks, etc. etc.; "it is quite two
+miles to Carroll Place." "It is, indeed; what is your fare?" "Only
+thirty-seven and a half cents;" (about two francs;) "and it is justly
+worth seventy-five, there is so much trumpery." "I will give you a
+dollar." "No more need be said, sir; you shall have everything safe." I
+was so much struck with this straight-forward manner of proceeding, after
+all I had undergone in Europe, that I made a note of it the same day.
+
+The Hôtel de l'Europe, at Rouen, was not a first-rate inn, for France,
+but it effectually removed the disagreeable impression left by the Hôtel
+d'Angleterre, at Havre. We were well lodged, well fed, and otherwise
+well treated. After ordering dinner, all of a suitable age hurried off
+to the cathedral.
+
+Rouen is an old, and by no means a well-built town. Some improvements
+along the river are on a large scale, and promise well; but the heart of
+the city is composed principally of houses of wooden frames, with the
+interstices filled in with cement. Work of this kind is very common in
+all the northern provincial towns of France. It gives a place a
+singular, and not altogether an unpicturesque air; the short dark studs
+that time has imbrowned, forming a sort of visible ribs to the houses.
+
+When we reached the little square in front of the cathedral, verily
+Henry the Seventh's chapel sunk into insignificance. I can only compare
+the effect of the chiselling on the quaint Gothic of this edifice, to
+that of an enormous skreen of dark lace, thrown into the form of a
+church. This was the first building of the kind that my companions had
+ever seen; and they had, insomuch, the advantage over me, as I had, in a
+degree, taken off the edge of wonder by the visit already mentioned to
+Westminster. The first look at this pile was one of inextricable
+details. It was not difficult to distinguish the vast and magnificent
+doors, and the beautiful oriel windows, buried as they were in ornament;
+but an examination was absolutely necessary to trace the little towers,
+pinnacles, and the crowds of pointed arches, amid such a scene of
+architectural confusion. "It is worth crossing the Atlantic, were it
+only to see this!" was the common feeling among us.
+
+It was some time before we discovered that divers dwellings had actually
+been built between the buttresses of the church, for their comparative
+diminutiveness, quaint style, and close incorporation with the pile,
+caused us to think them, at first, a part of the edifice itself. This
+desecration of the Gothic is of very frequent occurrence on the
+continent of Europe, taking its rise in the straitened limits of
+fortified towns, the cupidity of churchmen, and the general indifference
+to knowledge, and, consequently, to taste, which depressed the ages that
+immediately followed the construction of most of these cathedrals.
+
+We were less struck by the interior, than by the exterior of this
+building. It is vast, has some fine windows, and is purely Gothic; but
+after the richness of the external details, the aisles and the choir
+appeared rather plain. It possessed, however, in some of its monuments,
+subjects of great interest to those who had never stood over a grave of
+more than two centuries, and rarely even over one of half that age. Among
+other objects of this nature, is the heart of Coeur de Lion, for the
+church was commenced in the reign of one of his predecessors; Normandy at
+that time belonging to the English kings, and claiming to be the
+depository of the "lion heart."
+
+Rouen has many more memorials of the past. We visited the square in
+which Joan of Arc was burned; a small irregular area in front of her
+prison; the prison itself, and the hall in which she had been condemned.
+All these edifices are Gothic, quaint, and some of them sufficiently
+dilapidated.
+
+I had forgotten to relate, in its place, a fact, as an offset to the
+truculent garrulity of the porters. We were shown round the cathedral by
+a respectable-looking old man in a red scarf, a cocked hat, and a
+livery, one of the officers of the place. He was respectful, modest, and
+well instructed in his tale. The tone of this good old cicerone was so
+much superior to anything I had seen in England--in America such a
+functionary is nearly unknown--that, under the influence of our national
+manners, I had awkward doubts as to the propriety of offering him money.
+At length the five francs rescued from the cupidity of the
+half-civilized peasants of _la basse Normandie_ were put into his hand.
+A look of indecision caused me to repent the indiscretion. I thought his
+feelings had been wounded. "Est-ce que monsieur compte me présenter tout
+ceci?" I told him I hoped he would do me the favour to accept it. I had
+only given _more_ than was usual, and the honesty of the worthy cicerone
+hesitated about taking it. To know when to pay, and what to pay, is a
+useful attainment of the experienced traveller.
+
+Paris lay before us, and, although Rouen is a venerable and historical
+town, we were impatient to reach the French capital. A carriage was
+procured, and, on the afternoon of the second day, we proceeded.
+
+After quitting Rouen the road runs, for several miles, at the foot of
+high hills, and immediately on the banks of the Seine. At length we were
+compelled to climb the mountain which terminates near the city, and
+offers one of the noblest views in France, from a point called St.
+Catherine's Hill. We did not obtain so fine a prospect from the road,
+but the view far surpassed anything we had yet seen in Europe. Putting
+my head out of the window, when about half way up the ascent, I saw an
+object booming down upon us, at the rate of six or eight miles the hour,
+that resembled in magnitude at least a moving house. It was a diligence,
+and being the first we had met, it caused a general sensation in our
+party. Our heads were in each other's way, and finding it impossible to
+get a good view in any other manner, we fairly alighted in the highway,
+old and young, to look at the monster unincumbered. Our admiration and
+eagerness caused as much amusement to the travellers it held, as their
+extraordinary equipage gave rise to among us; and two merrier parties
+did not encounter each other on the public road that day.
+
+A proper diligence is formed of a chariot-body, and two coach-bodies
+placed one before the other, the first in front. These are all on a
+large scale, and the wheels and train are in proportion. On the roof
+(the three bodies are closely united) is a cabriolet, or covered seat,
+and baggage is frequently piled there, many feet in height. A large
+leathern apron covers the latter. An ordinary load of hay, though wider,
+is scarcely of more bulk than one of these vehicles, which sometimes
+carries twenty-five or thirty passengers, and two or three tons of
+luggage. The usual team is composed of five horses, two of which go on
+the pole, and three on the lead, the latter turning their heads
+outwards, as W---- remarked, so as to resemble a spread eagle.
+Notwithstanding the weight, these carriages usually go down a hill
+faster than when travelling on the plain. A bar of wood is brought, by
+means of a winch that is controlled by a person called the _conducteur_,
+one who has charge of both ship and cargo, to bear on the hind wheels,
+with a greater or less force, according to circumstances, so that all
+the pressure is taken off the wheel horses. A similar invention has
+latterly been applied to railroad cars. I have since gone over this
+very road with ten horses, two on the wheel, and eight in two lines on
+the lead. On that occasion, we came down this very hill, at the rate of
+nine miles the hour.
+
+After amusing ourselves with the spectacle of the diligence, we found the
+scenery too beautiful to re-enter the carriage immediately, and we walked
+to the top of the mountain. The view from the summit was truly admirable.
+The Seine comes winding its way through a broad rich valley, from the
+southward, having just before run east, and, a league or two beyond due
+west, our own Susquehanna being less crooked. The stream was not broad,
+but its numerous isles, willowy banks, and verdant meadows, formed a line
+for the eye to follow. Rouen in the distance, with its ebony towers,
+fantastic roofs, and straggling suburbs, lines its shores, at a curvature
+where the stream swept away west again, bearing craft of the sea on its
+bosom. These dark old towers have a sombre, mysterious air, which
+harmonizes admirably with the recollections that crowd the mind at such a
+moment! Scarce an isolated dwelling was to be seen, but the dense
+population is compressed into villages and _bourgs_, that dot the view,
+looking brown and teeming, like the nests of wasps. Some of these places
+have still remains of walls, and most of them are so compact and well
+defined that they appear more like vast castles than like the villages of
+England or America. All are grey, sombre, and without glare, rising from
+the background of pale verdure, so many appropriate _bas reliefs_.
+
+The road was strewed with peasants of both sexes, wending their way
+homeward, from the market of Rouen. One, a tawny woman, with no other
+protection for her head than a high but perfectly clean cap, was going
+past us, driving an ass, with the panniers loaded with manure. We were
+about six miles from the town, and the poor beast, after staggering some
+eight or ten miles to the market in the morning, was staggering back
+with this heavy freight, at even. I asked the woman, who, under the
+circumstances, could not be a resident of one of the neighbouring
+villages, the name of a considerable _bourg_ that lay about a gun-shot
+distant, in plain view, on the other side of the river. "Monsieur, je ne
+saurais pas vous dire, parce que, voyez-vous, je ne suis pas de ce
+pays-là," was the answer!
+
+Knowledge is the parent of knowledge. He who possesses most of the
+information of his age will not quietly submit to neglect its current
+acquisitions, but will go on improving as long as means and
+opportunities offer; while he who finds himself ignorant of most things,
+is only too apt to shrink from a labour which becomes Herculean. In this
+manner ambition is stifled, the mind gets to be inactive, and finally
+sinks into unresisting apathy. Such is the case with a large portion of
+the European peasantry. The multitude of objects that surround them
+becomes a reason of indifference; and they pass, from day to day, for a
+whole life, in full view of a town, without sufficient curiosity in its
+history to inquire its name, or, if told by accident, sufficient
+interest to remember it. We see this principle exemplified daily in
+cities. One seldom thinks of asking the name of a passer-by, though he
+may be seen constantly; whereas, in the country, such objects being
+comparatively rare, the stranger is not often permitted to appear
+without some question touching his character.[3]
+
+[Footnote 3: When in London, two years later, I saw a gentleman of rather
+striking appearance pass my door for two months, five or six times of a
+morning. Remembering the apathy of the Norman peasant, I at length asked
+who it was--"Sir Francis Burdett," was the answer.]
+
+I once inquired of a servant girl, at a French inn, who might be the
+owner of a chateau near by, the gate of which was within a hundred feet
+of the house we were in. She was unable to say, urging, as an apology,
+that she had only been six weeks in her present place! This, too, was in
+a small country hamlet. I think every one must have remarked, _coeteris
+paribus_, how much more activity and curiosity of mind is displayed by a
+countryman who first visits a town, than by the dweller in a city who
+first visits the country. The first wishes to learn everything, since be
+has been accustomed to understand everything he has hitherto seen; while
+the last, accustomed to a crowd of objects, usually regards most of the
+novel things he now sees for the first time with indifference.
+
+The road, for the rest of the afternoon, led us over hills and plains,
+from one reach of the river to another, for we crossed the latter
+repeatedly before reaching Paris. The appearance of the country was
+extraordinary in our eyes. Isolated houses were rare, but villages
+dotted the whole expanse. No obtrusive colours; but the eye had
+frequently to search against the hill-side, or in the valley, and, first
+detecting a mass, it gradually took in the picturesque angles, roofs,
+towers, and walls of the little _bourg_. Not a fence, or visible
+boundary of any sort, to mark the limits of possessions. Not a hoof in
+the fields grazing, and occasionally, a sweep of mountain-land resembled
+a pattern-card, with its stripes of green and yellow, and other hues,
+the narrow fields of the small proprietors. The play of light and shade
+on these gay upland patches though not strictly in conformity with the
+laws of taste, certainly was attractive. When they fell entirely into
+shadow, the harvest being over, and their gaudy colours lessened, they
+resembled the melancholy and wasted vestiges of a festival.
+
+At Louviers we dined, and there we found a new object of wonder in the
+church. It was of the Gothic of the _bourgs_, less elaborated and more
+rudely wrought than that of the larger towns, but quaint, and, the
+population considered, vast. Ugly dragons thrust out their grinning
+heads at us from the buttresses. The most agreeable monstrosities
+imaginable were crawling along the grey old stones. After passing this
+place, the scenery lost a good deal of the pastoral appearance which
+renders Normandy rather remarkable in France, and took still more of the
+starched pattern-card look, just mentioned. Still it was sombre, the
+villages were to be extracted by the eye from their setting of fields,
+and here and there one of those "silent fingers pointing to the skies"
+raised itself into the air, like a needle, to prick the consciences of
+the thoughtless. The dusky hues of all the villages contrasted oddly,
+and not unpleasantly, with the carnival colours of the grains.
+
+We slept at Vernon, and, before retiring for the night, passed half an
+hour in a fruitless attempt to carry by storm a large old circular tower,
+that is imputed to the inexhaustible industry of Caesar. This was the
+third of his reputed works that we had seen since landing in France. In
+this part of Europe, Caesar has the credit of everything for which no one
+else is willing to apply, as is the case with Virgil at Naples.
+
+It was a sensation to rise in the morning with the rational prospect of
+seeing Paris, for the first time in one's life, before night. In my
+catalogue it stands numbered as sensation the 5th; Westminster, the
+night arrival in France, and the Cathedral of Rouen, giving birth to
+numbers 1, 2, and 4. Though accustomed to the tattoo, and the evening
+bugle of a man-of-war, the drums of Havre had the honour of number 3.
+Alas! how soon we cease to feel those agreeable excitements at all, even
+a drum coming in time to pall on the ear!
+
+Near Vernon we passed a village, which gave us the first idea of one
+feature in the old _régime_. The place was grey, sombre, and
+picturesque, as usual, in the distance; but crowded, dirty,
+inconvenient, and mean, when the eye got too near. Just without the
+limits of its nuisances stood the chateau, a regular pile of hewn stone,
+with formal _allées_, abundance of windows, extensive stables, and
+broken vases. The ancient _seigneur_ probably retained no more of this
+ancient possession than its name, while some Monsieur Le Blanc, or
+Monsieur Le Noir, filled his place in the house, and "personne dans la
+seigneurie."
+
+A few leagues farther brought us to an eminence, whence we got a
+beautiful glimpse of the sweeping river, and of a wide expanse of
+fertile country less formally striped and more picturesque than the
+preceding. Another grey castellated town lay on the verge of the river,
+with towers that seemed even darker than ever. How different was all
+this from the glare of our own objects! As we wound round the brow of
+the height, extensive park-grounds, a village more modern, less
+picturesque, and less dirty than common, with a large chateau in red
+bricks, was brought in sight, in the valley. This was Rosny, the place
+that gave his hereditary title to the celebrated Sully, as Baron and
+Marquis de Rosny; Sully, a man, who, like Bacon, almost deserves the
+character so justly given of the latter by Pope, that of "The wisest,
+greatest, _meanest_, of mankind." The house and grounds were now the
+property of Madame, as it is the etiquette to term the Duchesse de
+Berri. The town in the distance, with the dark towers, was Mantes, a
+place well known in the history of Normandy. We breakfasted at Le Cheval
+Blanc. The church drew us all out, but it was less monstrous than that
+of Louviers, and, as a cathedral, unworthy to be named with those of the
+larger places.
+
+The next stage brought us to St. Germain-en-Laye, or to the verge of the
+circle of low mountains that surround the plains of Paris. Here we got
+within the influence of royal magnificence and the capital. The
+Bourbons, down to the period of the revolution, were indeed kings, and
+they have left physical and moral impressions of their dynasty of seven
+hundred years, that will require as long a period to eradicate. Nearly
+every foot of the entire semi-circle of hills to the west of Paris is
+historical, and garnished by palaces, pavilions, forests, parks,
+aqueducts, gardens, or chases. A carriage terrace, of a mile in length,
+and on a most magnificent scale in other respects, overlooks the river,
+at an elevation of several hundred feet above its bed. The palace
+itself, a quaint old edifice of the time of Francis I, who seems to have
+had an architecture not unlike that of Elizabeth of England, has long
+been abandoned as a royal abode. I believe its last royal occupant was
+the dethroned James II. It is said to have been deserted by its owners,
+because it commands a distant view of that silent monitor, the sombre
+beautiful spire of St. Denis, whose walls shadow the vaults of the
+Bourbons; they who sat on a throne not choosing to be thus constantly
+reminded of the time when they must descend to the common fate and
+crumbling equality of the grave.
+
+An aqueduct, worthy of the Romans, gave an imposing idea of the scale on
+which these royal works were conducted. It appeared, at the distance of
+a league or two, a vast succession of arches, displaying a broader range
+of masonry than I had ever before seen. So many years had passed since I
+was last in Europe, that I gazed in wonder at its vastness.
+
+From St. Germain we plunged into the valley, and took our way towards
+Paris, by a broad paved avenue, that was bordered with trees. The road
+now began to show an approach to a capital, being crowded with all sorts
+of uncouth-looking vehicles, used as public conveyances. Still it was on
+a Lilliputian scale as compared to London, and semi-barbarous even as
+compared to one of our towns. Marly-la-Machine was passed; an hydraulic
+invention to force water up the mountains to supply the different
+princely dwellings of the neighbourhood. Then came a house of no great
+pretension, buried in trees, at the foot of the bill. This was the
+celebrated consular abode, Malmaison. After this we mounted to a hamlet,
+and the road stretched away before us, with the river between, to the
+unfinished Arc de l'Étoile, or the barrier of the capital. The evening
+was soft, and there had been a passing shower. As the mist drove away, a
+mass rose like a glittering beacon, beyond the nearest hill, proclaiming
+Paris. It was the dome of the Hotel of the Invalids!
+
+Though Paris possesses better points of view from its immediate vicinity
+than most capitals, it is little seen from any of its ordinary
+approaches until fairly entered. We descended to the river by a gentle
+declivity. The chateau and grounds of Neuilly, a private possession of
+the Duke of Orleans, lay on our left; the Bois de Boulogne, the carriage
+promenade of the capital, on our right. We passed one of those
+abortions, a _magnificent_ village, (Neuilly,) and ascended gently
+towards the unfinished Arch of the Star. Bending around this imposing
+memorial of--Heaven knows what! for it has had as many destinations as
+France has had governors--we entered the iron gate of the barrier, and
+found ourselves within the walls of Paris.
+
+We were in the Avenue de Neuilly. The Champs Elysées, without verdure, a
+grove divided by the broad approach, and moderately peopled by a
+well-dressed crowd, lay on each side. In front, at the distance of a
+mile, was a mass of foliage that looked more like a rich copse in park
+than an embellishment of a town garden; and above this, again, peered
+the pointed roofs of two or three large and high members of some vast
+structure, sombre in colour and quaint in form. They were the pavilions
+of the Tuileries.[4] A line of hotels became visible through trees and
+shrubbery on the left, and on the right we soon got evidence that we
+were again near the river. We had just left it behind us, and after a
+_détour_ of several leagues, here it was again flowing in our front,
+cutting in twain the capital.
+
+[Footnote 4: Tuileries is derived from _Tuile_, or tile; the site of the
+present gardens having been a tile-yard.]
+
+Objects now grew confused, for they came fast. We entered and crossed a
+paved area, that lay between the Seine, the Champs Elysées, the garden
+of the Tuileries, and two little palaces of extraordinary beauty of
+architecture. This was the place where Louis XVI. and his unfortunate
+wife were beheaded. Passing between the two edifices last named, we came
+upon the Boulevards, and plunged at once into the street-gaiety and
+movement of this remarkable town.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER V.
+
+Paris in August 1826.--Montmartre.--The Octroi.--View of Paris.
+--Montmorency.--Royal Residences.--Duke of Bordeaux.--Horse-racing.
+--The Dauphine.--Popular feeling in Paris.--Royal Equipage.--Gardes du
+Corps.--Policy of Napoleon.--Centralization.
+
+
+To R COOPER, ESQ., COOPERSTOWN.
+
+We were not a fortnight in Paris before we were quietly established, _en
+bourgeois_, in the Faubourg St. Germain. Then followed the long and
+wearying toil of sight-seeing. Happily, our time was not limited, and we
+took months for that which is usually performed in a few days. This
+labour is connected with objects that description has already rendered
+familiar, and I shall say nothing of them, except as they may
+incidentally belong to such parts of my subject as I believe worthy to
+be noticed.
+
+Paris was empty in the month of August 1826. The court was at St. Cloud;
+the Duchesse de Berri at her favourite Dieppe; and the fashionable world
+was scattered abroad over the face of Europe. Our own minister was at
+the baths of Aix, in Savoy.
+
+One of the first things was to obtain precise and accurate ideas of the
+position and _entourage_ of the place. In addition to those enjoyed from
+its towers, there are noble views of Paris from Montmartre and Père
+Lachaise. The former has the best look-out, and thither we proceeded.
+This little mountain is entirely isolated, forming no part of the
+exterior circle of heights which environ the town. It lies north of the
+walls, which cross its base. The ascent is so steep as to require a
+winding road, and the summit, a table of a hundred acres, is crowned by
+a crowded village, a church, and divers windmills. There was formerly a
+convent or two, and small country-houses still cling to its sides,
+buried in the shrubbery that clothe their terraces.
+
+We were fortunate in our sky, which was well veiled in clouds, and
+occasionally darkened by mists. A bright sun may suit particular scenes,
+and peculiar moods of the mind, but every connoisseur in the beauties of
+nature will allow that, as a rule, clouds, and very frequently a partial
+obscurity, greatly aid a landscape. This is yet more true of a
+bird's-eye view of a grey old mass of walls, which give up their
+confused and dusky objects all the better for the absence of glare. I
+love to study a place teeming with historical recollections, under this
+light; leaving the sites of memorable scenes to issue, one by one, out
+of the grey mass of gloom, as time gives up its facts from the obscurity
+of ages.
+
+Unlike English and American towns, Paris has scarcely any suburbs. Those
+parts which are called its Faubourgs are, in truth, integral parts of
+the city; and, with the exception of a few clusters of winehouses and
+_guinguettes_, which have collected near its gates to escape the city
+duties, the continuity of houses ceases suddenly with the _barrières_,
+and, at the distance of half a mile from the latter, one is as
+effectually in the country, so far as the eye is concerned, as if a
+hundred leagues in the provinces. The unfenced meadows, vineyards,
+lucerne, oats, wheat, and vegetables, in many places, literally reach
+the walls. These walls are not intended for defence, but are merely a
+financial _enceinte_, created for offensive operations against the
+pockets of the inhabitants. Every town in France that has two thousand
+inhabitants is entitled to set up an _octroi_ on its articles of
+consumption, and something like four millions of dollars are taken
+annually at the gates of Paris, in duties on this internal trade. It is
+merely the old expedient to tax the poor, by laying impositions on food
+and necessaries.
+
+From the windmills of Montmartre, the day we ascended, the eye took in
+the whole vast capital at a glance. The domes sprung up through the
+mist, like starling balloons; and here and there the meandering stream
+threw back a gleam of silvery light. Enormous roofs denoted the sites of
+the palaces, churches, or theatres. The summits of columns, the crosses
+of the minor churches, and the pyramids of pavilion tops, seemed
+struggling to rear their heads from out the plain of edifices. A better
+idea of the vastness of the principal structures was obtained here in
+one hour, than could be got from the streets in a twelvemonth. Taking
+the roofs of the palace, for instance, the eye followed its field of
+slate and lead through a parallelogram for quite a mile. The sheet of
+the French opera resembled a blue pond, and the aisles of Notre Dame and
+St. Eustache, with their slender ribs and massive buttresses, towered so
+much above the lofty houses around them, as to seem to stand on their
+ridges. The church of St. Geneviève, the Pantheon of the revolution,
+faced us on the swelling land of the opposite side of the town, but
+surrounded still with crowded lines of dwellings; the Observatory
+limiting equally the view, and the vast field of houses in that
+direction.
+
+Owing to the state of the atmosphere, and the varying light, the picture
+before us was not that simply of a town, but, from the multiplicity and
+variety of its objects, it was a vast and magnificent view. I have
+frequently looked at Paris since from the same spot, or from its church
+towers, when the strong sunlight reduced it to the appearance of confused
+glittering piles, on which the eye almost refused to dwell; but, in a
+clouded day, all the peculiarities stand out sombre and distinct,
+resembling the grey accessories of the ordinary French landscape.
+
+From the town we turned to the heights which surround it. East and
+south-east, after crossing the Seine, the country lay in the waste-like
+unfenced fields which characterize the scenery of this part of Europe.
+Roads stretched away in the direction of Orleans, marked by the usual
+lines of clipped and branchless trees. More to the west commence the
+abrupt heights, which, washed by the river, enclose nearly half the wide
+plain, like an amphitheatre. This has been the favourite region of the
+kings of France, from the time of Louis XIII. down to the present day.
+The palaces of Versailles, St. Germain, St. Cloud, and Meudon, all lie
+in this direction, within short distances of the capital; and the royal
+forests, avenues, and chases intersect it in every direction, as
+mentioned before.
+
+Farther north, the hills rise to be low mountains, though a wide and
+perfectly level plain spreads itself between the town and their bases,
+varying in breadth from two to four leagues. On the whole of this
+expanse of cultivated fields, there was hardly such a thing as an
+isolated house. Though not literally true, this fact was so nearly so as
+to render the effect oddly peculiar, when one stood on the eastern
+extremity of Montmartre, where, by turning southward, he looked down
+upon the affluence and heard the din of a vast capital, and by turning
+northward, he beheld a country with all the appliances of rural life,
+and dotted by grey villages. Two places, however, were in sight, in this
+direction, that might aspire to be termed towns. One was St. Denis, from
+time immemorial the burying-place of the French kings; and the other was
+Montmorency, the _bourg_ which gives its name to, or receives it from,
+the illustrious family that is so styled; for I am unable to say which
+is the fact. The church spire of the former is one of the most beautiful
+objects in view from Montmartre, the church itself, which was desecrated
+in the revolution, having been restored by Napoleon. St. Denis is
+celebrated, in the Catholic annals, by the fact of the martyr, from whom
+the name is derived, having walked after decapitation, with his head
+under his arm, all the way from Paris to this very spot.
+
+Montmorency is a town of no great size or importance, but lying on the
+side of a respectable mountain, in a way to give the spectator more than
+a profile, it appears to be larger than it actually is. This place is
+scarcely distinguishable from Paris, under the ordinary light; but on a
+day like that which we had chosen, it stood out in fine relief from the
+surrounding fields, even the grey mass of its church being plainly
+visible. If Paris is so beautiful and striking when seen from the
+surrounding heights, there are many singularly fine pictures in the
+bosom of the place itself. We rarely crossed the Pont Royal, during the
+first month or two of our residence, without stopping the carriage to
+gaze at the two remarkable views it offers. One is up the reach of the
+Seine which stretches through the heart of the town, separated by the
+island; and the other, in an opposite direction, looks down the reach by
+which the stream flows into the meadows, on its way to the sea. The
+first is a look into the avenues of a large town, the eye resting on the
+quaint outlines and endless mazes of walls, towers, and roofs; while the
+last is a prospect, in which the front of the picture is a collection of
+some of the finest objects of a high state of civilization, and the
+background a beautiful termination of wooded and decorated heights.
+
+At first, one who is accustomed to the forms and movements of a sea-port
+feels a little disappointment at seeing a river that bears nothing but
+dingy barges loaded with charcoal and wine-casks. The magnificence of
+the quays seems disproportioned to the trifling character of the
+commerce they are destined to receive. But familiarity with the town
+soon changes all these notions, and while we admit that Paris is
+altogether secondary, so far as trade is concerned, we come to feel the
+magnificence of her public works, and to find something that is pleasing
+and picturesque, even in her huge and unwieldy wood and coal barges.
+Trade is a good thing in its way, but its agents rarely contribute to
+the taste, learning, manners, or morals of a nation.
+
+The sight of the different interesting objects that encircle Paris
+stimulated our curiosity to nearer views, and we proceeded immediately
+to visit the environs. These little excursions occupied more than a
+month, and they not only made us familiar with the adjacent country,
+but, by compelling us to pass out at nearly every one of the twenty or
+thirty different gates or barriers, as they are called, with a large
+portion of the town also. This capital has been too often described to
+render any further account of the principal objects necessary, and in
+speaking of it, I shall endeavour to confine my remarks to things that I
+think may still interest you by their novelty.
+
+The royal residences in Paris at this time are, strictly speaking, but
+two,--the Tuileries and the Palais Royal. The Louvre is connected with
+the first, and it has no finished apartments that are occupied by any of
+princely rank, most of its better rooms being unfinished, and are
+occupied as cabinets or museums. A small palace, called the Elysée
+Bourbon, is fitted up as a residence for the heir presumptive, the Duc
+de Bordeaux; but, though it contains his princely toys, such as
+miniature batteries of artillery, etc., he is much too young to maintain
+a separate establishment. This little scion of royalty only completed
+his seventh year not long after our arrival in France; on which occasion
+one of those silly ceremonies, which some of the present age appear to
+think inseparable from sound principles, was observed. The child was
+solemnly and formally transferred from the care of the women to that of
+the men. Up to this period, Madame la Vicomtesse de Gontaut-Biron had
+been his governess, and she now resigned her charge into the hands of
+the Baron de Damas, who had lately been Minister of Foreign Affairs.
+Madame de Gontaut was raised to the rank of Duchess on the occasion. The
+boy himself is said to have passed from the hands of the one party to
+those of the other, in presence of the whole court, _absolutely naked_.
+Some such absurdity was observed at the reception of Marie Antoinette,
+it being a part of regal etiquette that a royal bride, on entering
+France, should leave her old wardrobe, even to the last garment, behind
+her. You will be amused to hear that there are people in Europe who
+still attach great importance to a rigid adherence to all the old
+etiquette at similar ceremonies. These are the men who believe it to be
+essential that judges and advocates should wear wigs, in an age when,
+their use being rejected by the rest of the world, their presence cannot
+fail, if it excite any feeling, to excite that of inconvenience and
+absurdity. There is such a thing as leaving society too naked, I admit;
+but a _chemise_, at least, could not have injured the little Duke of
+Bordeaux at this ceremony. Whenever a usage that is poetical in itself,
+and which awakens a sentiment without doing violence to decency, or
+comfort, or common sense, can be preserved, I would rigidly adhere to
+it, if it were only for antiquity's sake; but, surely, it would be far
+more rational for judges to wear false beards, because formerly Bacon
+and Coke did not shave their chins, than it is for a magistrate to
+appear on the bench with a cumbrous, hot, and inconvenient cloud of
+powdered flax, or whatever may be the material on his poll, because our
+ancestors, a century or two since, were so silly as to violate nature in
+the same extraordinary manner.
+
+Speaking of the Duke of Bordeaux, reminds me of an odd, and, indeed, in
+some degree a painful scene, of which I was accidentally a witness, a
+short time before the ceremony just mentioned. The _émigrés_ have
+brought back with them into France a taste for horse-racing, and,
+supported by a few of the English who are here, there are regular races,
+spring and autumn, in the Champs de Mars. The course is one of the
+finest imaginable, being more than a mile in circumference, and
+surrounded by mounds of earth, raised expressly with that object, which
+permit the spectators to overlook the entire field. The result is a
+species of amphitheatric arena, in which any of the dramatic
+exhibitions, that are so pleasing to this spectacle-loving nation, may
+be enacted. Pavilions are permanently erected at the starting-post, and
+one or two of these are usually fitted up for the use of the court,
+whenever it is the pleasure of the royal family to attend, as was the
+case at the time the little occurrence I am about to relate took place.
+
+On this occasion Charles X. came in royal state, from St. Cloud,
+accompanied by detachments of his guards, many carriages, several of
+which were drawn by eight horses, and a cloud of mounted footmen. Most
+of the dignitaries of the kingdom were present, in the different
+pavilions, or stands, and nearly or quite all the ministers, together
+with the whole diplomatic corps. There could not have been less than a
+hundred thousand spectators on the mounds.
+
+The racing itself was no great matter, being neither within time nor
+well contested. The horses were all French, the trial being intended for
+the encouragement of the French breeders, and the sports were yet too
+recent to have produced much influence on the stock of the country.
+During the heats, accompanied by a young American friend, I had strolled
+among the royal equipages, in order to examine their magnificence, and
+returning towards the course, we came out unexpectedly at a little open
+space, immediately at one end of the pavilion in which the royal family
+was seated. There were not a dozen people near us, and one of these was
+a sturdy Englishman, evidently a tradesman, who betrayed a keen and a
+truly national desire to get a look at the king. The head of a little
+girl was just visible above the side of the pavilion, and my companion,
+who, by a singular accident, not long before, had been thrown into
+company with _les enfans de France_, as the royal children are called,
+informed me that it was Mademoiselle d'Artois, the sister of the heir
+presumptive. He had given me a favourable account of the children, whom
+he represented as both lively and intelligent, and I changed my position
+a little, to get a better look of the face of this little personage, who
+was not twenty feet from the spot where we stood. My movement attracted
+her attention; and, after looking down a moment into the small area in
+which we were enclosed, she disappeared. Presently a lady looked over
+the balustrade, and our Englishman seemed to be on tenter-hooks. Some
+thirty or forty French gathered round us immediately, and I presume it
+was thought none but loyal subjects could manifest so much desire to
+gaze at the family, especially as one or two of the French clapped the
+little princess, whose head now appeared and disappeared again, as if
+she were earnestly pressing something on the attention of those within
+the pavilion. In a moment the form of a pale and sickly-looking boy was
+seen, the little girl, who was a year or two older, keeping her place at
+his side. The boy was raised on the knee of a melancholy-looking and
+rather hard-featured female of fifty, who removed his straw hat in order
+to salute us. "These are the Dauphine and the Duc de Bordeaux,"
+whispered my companion, who knew the person of the former by sight. The
+Dauphine looked anxiously, and I thought mournfully, at the little
+cluster we formed directly before her, as if waiting to observe in what
+manner her nephew would be received. Of course my friend and myself, who
+were in the foreground, stood uncovered; as gentlemen we could not do
+less, nor as _foreign_ gentlemen could we very well do more. Not a
+Frenchman, however, even touched his hat! On the other hand, the
+Englishman straddled his legs, gave a wide sweep with his beaver, and
+uttered as hearty a hurrah as if he had been cheering a member of
+parliament who gave gin in his beer. The effect of this single,
+unaccompanied, unanswered cheer, was both ludicrous and painful. The
+poor fellow himself seemed startled at hearing his own voice amid so
+profound a stillness, and checking his zeal as unexpectedly as he had
+commenced its exhibition, he looked furiously around him and walked
+surlily away. The Dauphine followed him with her eyes. There was no
+mistaking his gaitered limbs, dogged mien, and florid countenance; be
+clearly was not French, and those that were, as clearly turned his
+enthusiasm into ridicule. I felt sorry for her, as, with a saddened
+face, she set down the boy, and withdrew her own head within the
+covering of the pavilion. The little Mademoiselle d'Artois kept her
+bright looks, in a sort of wonder, on us, until the circumspection of
+those around her, gave her a hint to disappear.
+
+This was the first direct and near view I got of the true state of
+popular feeling in Paris towards the reigning family. According to the
+journals in the interest of the court, enthusiasm was invariably
+exhibited whenever any of their princes appeared in public; but the
+journals in every country, our own dear and shrewd republic not
+excepted, are very unsafe guides for those who desire truth.
+
+I am told that the style of this court has been materially altered, and
+perhaps improved, by the impetuous character of Napoleon. The king
+rarely appears in public with less than eight horses, which are usually
+in a foam. His liveries are not showy, neither are the carriages as neat
+and elegant as one would expect. The former are blue and white, with a
+few slight ornaments of white and red lace, and the vehicles are showy,
+large and even magnificent, but, I think, without good taste. You will
+be surprised to hear that he drives with what in America we call "Dutch
+collars." Six of the horses are held in hand, and the leaders are
+managed by a postilion. There is always one or more empty carriages,
+according to the number of the royal personages present, equipped in
+every respect like those which are filled, and which are held in reserve
+against accidents; a provision, by the way, that is not at all
+unreasonable in those who scamper over the broken pavements, in and
+about Paris, as fast as leg can be put to the ground.
+
+Notwithstanding the present magnificence of the court, royalty is shorn
+of much of its splendour in France, since the days of Louis XVI. Then a
+city of a hundred thousand souls (Versailles) was a mere dependant of
+the crown; lodgings for many hundred _abbés_, it is said, were provided
+in the palace alone, and a simple representation at the palace opera
+cost a fortune.
+
+It is not an easy matter to come at the real cost of the kingly office
+in this country, all the expenditures of the European governments being
+mystified in such a way, as to require a very intimate knowledge of the
+details to give a perfectly clear account of them. But, so far as I have
+been able to ascertain, the charges that arise from this feature of the
+system do not fall much short, if indeed they do any, of eight millions
+of dollars annually. Out of this sum, however, the king pays the extra
+allowances of his guards, the war office taking the same view of all
+classes of soldiers, after distinguishing between foot and cavalry. You
+will get an idea of the luxury of royalty by a short account of the
+_gardes du corps_. These troops are all officers, the privates having
+the rank and receiving the pay of lieutenants. Their duty, as the name
+implies, is to have the royal person in their especial care, and there
+is always a guard of them in an ante-chamber of the royal apartments.
+They are heavy cavalry, and when they mount guard in the palaces, their
+arm is a carabine. A party of them always appear near the carriage of
+the king, or indeed near that of any of the reigning branch of the
+family. There are said to be four regiments or companies of them, of
+four hundred men each; but it strikes me the number must be exaggerated.
+I should think, however, that there are fully a thousand of them. In
+addition to these selected troops, there are three hundred Swiss, of the
+Swiss and royal guards; of the latter, including all arms, there must be
+many thousands. These are the troops that usually mount guard in and
+about all the palaces. The annual budget of France appears in the
+estimates at about a _milliard_, or a thousand millions of francs; but
+the usual mystifications are resorted to, and the truth will give the
+annual central expenses of the country at not less, I think, than two
+hundred millions of dollars. This sum, however, covers many items of
+expenditure, that we are accustomed to consider purely local. The
+clergy, for instance, are paid out of it, as is a portion of the cost of
+maintaining the roads. On the other hand, much money is collected, as a
+general regulation, that does not appear in the budget. Few or no
+churches are built, and there are charges for masses, interments,
+christenings, and fees for a hundred things, of which no account is
+taken in making out the sum total of the cost of government.
+
+It was the policy of Napoleon to create a system of centralization, that
+should cause everything to emanate from himself. The whole organization
+of government had this end in view, and all the details of the
+departments have been framed expressly to further this object. The
+prefects are no more than so many political _aides_, whose duty it is to
+carry into effect the orders that emanate from the great head, and lines
+of telegraphs are established all over France, in such a way that a
+communication may be sent from the Tuileries, to the remotest corner of
+the kingdom, in the course of a few hours. It has been said that one of
+the first steps towards effecting a revolution, ought to be to seize the
+telegraphs at Paris, by means of which such information and orders could
+be sent into the provinces, as the emergency might seem to require.
+
+This system of centralization has almost neutralized the advancement of
+the nation, in a knowledge of the usages and objects of the political
+liberty that the French have obtained, by bitter experience, from other
+sources. It is the constant aim of that portion of the community which
+understands the action of free institutions, to increase the powers of
+the municipalities, and to lessen the functions of the central
+government; but their efforts are resisted with a jealous distrust of
+everything like popular dictation. Their municipal privileges are,
+rightly enough, thought to be the entering wedges of real liberty. The
+people ought to manage their own affairs, just as far as they can do so
+without sacrificing their interests for want of a proper care, and here
+is the starting point of representation. So far from France enjoying
+such a system, however, half the time a bell cannot be hung in a parish
+church, or a bridge repaired, without communications with and orders
+from Paris.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER VI.
+
+Letters of Introduction.--European Etiquette.--Diplomatic Entertainments.
+--Ladies in Coffee-houses.--French Hospitality.--Mr. Canning at Paris.
+--Parisian Hotels.--French Lady at Washington.--Receptions in Paris
+and in New York.--Mode of Announcement.--Republican Affectation.
+--Hotel Monaco.--Dinner given to Mr. Canning.--Diplomatic Etiquette.
+--European Ambassadors.--Prime Minister of France.--Mr. Canning.
+--Count Pozzo di Borgo.--Precedency at Dinner.--American Etiquette.
+--A French Dinner.--Servants.--Catholic Fasting.--Conversation with
+Canning.--English Prejudice against Americans.
+
+
+To MRS. POMEROY, COOPERSTOWN, NEW YORK.
+
+I quitted America with some twenty letters of introduction, that had
+been pressed upon me by different friends, but which were carefully
+locked up in a secretary, where they still remain, and are likely to
+remain for ever, or until they are destroyed. As this may appear a
+singular resolution for one who left his own country to be absent for
+years, I shall endeavour to explain it. In the first place, I have a
+strong repugnance to pushing myself on the acquaintance of any man: this
+feeling may, in fact, proceed from pride, but I have a disposition to
+believe that it proceeds, in part, also from a better motive. These
+letters of introduction, like verbal introductions, are so much abused
+in America, that the latter feeling, perhaps I might say both feelings,
+are increased by the fact. Of all the people in the world we are the
+most prodigal of these favours, when self-respect and propriety would
+teach us we ought to be among the most reserved, simply because the
+character of the nation is so low, that the European, more than half the
+time, fancies he is condescending when he bestows attentions on our
+people at all. Other travellers may give you a different account of the
+matter, but let every one be responsible for his own opinions and facts.
+Then a friend who, just as we left home, returned from Europe after an
+absence of five years, assured me that he found his letters of but
+little use; that nearly every agreeable acquaintance he made was the
+result of accident, and that the Europeans in general were much more
+cautious in giving and receiving letters of this nature than ourselves.
+
+The usages of all Europe, those of the English excepted, differ from our
+own on the subject of visits. There the stranger, or the latest arrival,
+is expected to make the first visit, and an inquiry for your address is
+always taken for an intimation that your acquaintance would be
+acceptable. Many, perhaps most Americans, lose a great deal through
+their provincial breeding, in this respect, in waiting for attentions
+that it is their duty to invite, by putting themselves in the way of
+receiving them. The European usage is not only the most rational, but it
+is the most delicate. It is the most rational, as there is a manifest
+absurdity in supposing, for instance, that the inhabitant of a town is
+to know whenever a visitor from the country arrives; and it is the most
+delicate, as it leaves the newcomer, who is supposed to know his own
+wishes best, to decide for himself whether he wishes to make
+acquaintances or not. In short, our own practices are provincial and
+rustic, and cannot exist when the society of the country shall have
+taken the usual phases of an advanced civilization. Even in England, in
+the higher classes, the cases of distinguished men excepted, it is usual
+for the stranger to seek the introduction.
+
+Under such circumstances, coupled with the utter insignificance of an
+ordinary individual in a town like Paris, you will easily understand
+that we had the first months of our residence entirely to ourselves. As
+a matter of course, we called on our own minister and his wife; and, as
+a matter of course, we have been included in the dinners and parties
+that they are accustomed to give at this season of the year. This,
+however, has merely brought us in contact with a chance-medley of our
+own countrymen, these diplomatic entertainments being quite obviously a
+matter of accident, so far as the set is concerned. The dinners of your
+banker, however, are still worse, since with them the visiting-list is
+usually a mere extract from the ledger.
+
+Our privacy has not been without its advantages. It has enabled us to
+visit all the visible objects without the incumbrance of engagements, and
+given me leisure to note and to comment on things that might otherwise
+have been overlooked. For several months we have had nothing to do but to
+see sights, get familiarized with a situation that, at first, we found
+singularly novel, and to brush up our French.
+
+I never had sufficient faith in the popular accounts of the usages of
+other countries, to believe one-half of what I have heard. I distrusted
+from the first the fact of ladies--I mean real, _bona fide_ ladies, women
+of sentiment, delicacy, taste, and condition--frequenting public
+eating-houses, and habitually living, without the retirement and reserve
+that is so necessary to all _women_, not to say _men_, of the _caste_. I
+found it difficult, therefore, to imagine I should meet with many females
+of condition in _restaurans_ and _cafés_. Such a thing might happen on an
+emergency, but it was assailing too much all those feelings and tastes
+which become inherent in refinement, to suppose that the tables of even
+the best house of the sort in Paris could be honoured by the presence of
+such persons, except under particular circumstances. My own observation
+corroborated this opinion, and, in order to make sure of the fact, I have
+put the question to nearly every Frenchwoman of rank it has since been my
+good fortune to become sufficiently acquainted with to take the liberty.
+The answer has been uniform. Such things are sometimes done, but rarely;
+and even then it is usual to have the service in a private room. One old
+lady, a woman perfectly competent to decide on such a point, told me
+frankly:--"We never do it, except by way of a frolic, or when in a humour
+which induces people to do many other silly and unbecoming things. Why
+should we go to the _restaurateurs_ to eat? We have our own houses and
+servants as well as the English, or even you Americans"--it may be
+supposed I laughed--"and certainly the French are not so devoid of good
+taste as not to understand that the mixed society of a public-house is
+not the best possible company for a woman."
+
+It is, moreover, a great mistake to imagine that the French are not
+hospitable, and that they do not entertain as freely, and as often, as
+any other people. The only difference between them and the English, in
+this respect, or between them and ourselves, is in the better taste and
+ease which regulate their intercourse of this nature. While there is a
+great deal of true elegance, there is no fuss, at a French
+entertainment; and all that you have heard of the superiority of the
+kitchen in this country, is certainly true. Society is divided into
+_castes_ in Paris, as it is everywhere else; and the degrees of elegance
+and refinement increase as one ascends as a matter of course; but there
+is less of effort, in every class, than is usual with us. One of the
+best-bred Englishmen of my acquaintance, and one, too, who had long been
+in the world, has frankly admitted to me, that the highest tone of
+English society is merely an imitation of that which existed in Paris
+previously to the revolution, and of which, though modified as to usages
+and forms, a good deal still remains. By the highest tone, however, you
+are not to suppose I mean that laboured, frigid, heartless manner that
+so many, in England especially, mistake for high breeding, merely
+because they do not know how to unite with the finish which constant
+intercourse with the world creates, the graceful semblance of living
+less for one's self than for others, and to express, as it were, their
+feelings and wishes, rather than to permit one's own to escape him--a
+habit that, like the reflection of a mirror, produces the truest and
+most pleasing images, when thrown back from surfaces the most highly
+polished. But I am anticipating rather than giving you a history of what
+I have seen.
+
+In consequence of our not having brought any letters, as has just been
+mentioned, and of not having sought society, no one gave themselves any
+trouble on our account for the first three or four months of our
+residence in Paris. At the end of that period, however, I made my
+_début_ at, probably, as brilliant an entertainment as one usually sees
+here in the course of a whole winter. Mr. Canning, then Secretary of
+State for Foreign Affairs, came to Paris on a visit, and, as is usual on
+such occasions, diplomacy was a good deal mixed up with eating and
+drinking. Report says, that the etiquette of the court was a good deal
+deranged by this visit, the Bourbons not having adopted the hale-fellow
+hospitality of the English kings. M. de Villèle or M. de Damas would be
+invited to dine at Windsor almost as a matter of course; but the
+descendant of Hugh Capet hesitated about breaking bread with an English
+commoner. The matter is understood to have been gotten over, by giving
+the entertainment at St. Cloud, where, it would seem, the royal person
+has fewer immunities than at the Tuileries. But, among other attentions
+that were bestowed on the English statesman, Mr. Brown determined to
+give him a great diplomatic dinner; and our own legations having a great
+poverty of subordinates, except in the way of travelling _attachés_, I
+was invited to occupy one end of the table, while the regular secretary
+took his seat at the other. Before I attempt a short description of this
+entertainment, it may help to enliven the solitude of your mountain
+residence, and serve to give you more distinct ideas of the matter than
+can be obtained from novels, if I commence with a summary of the
+appliances and modes of polite intercourse in this part of the world, as
+they are to be distinguished from our own.
+
+In the first place, you are to discard from your mind all images of two
+rooms and folding-doors, with a passage six feet wide, a narrow carpeted
+flight of steps, and a bed-room prepared for the ladies to uncloak in,
+and another in which the men can brush their hair and hide their hats.
+Some such snuggeries very possibly exist in England, among the middling
+classes; but I believe all over the continent of Europe style is never
+attempted without more suitable means to carry out the intention.
+
+In Paris, every one who mingles with the world lives in an hotel, or a
+house that has a court and an outer gate. Usually the building surrounds
+three sides of this court, and sometimes the whole four; though small
+hotels are to be found, in which the court is encircled on two, or even
+on three of its sides, merely by high walls. The gate is always in the
+keeping of a regular porter, who is an important personage about the
+establishment, taking in letters, tickets, etc., ejecting blackguards
+and all other suspicious persons, carrying messages, besides levying
+contributions on all the inmates of the house, in the way of wood and
+coal. In short, he is in some measure, held to be responsible for the
+exits and entrances, being a sort of domestic gendarme. In the larger
+hotels there are two courts, the great and _la basse cour_, the latter
+being connected with the offices and stables.
+
+Of course, these hotels vary in size and magnificence. Some are not
+larger than our own largest town dwellings, while others, again, are
+palaces. As these buildings were originally constructed to lodge a
+single establishment, they have their principal and their inferior
+apartments; some have their summer and their winter apartments. As is,
+and always must be the case, where everything like state and
+magnificence are affected, the reception-rooms are en suite; the mode of
+building which prevails in America, being derived from the secondary
+class of English houses. It is true, that in London, many men of rank,
+perhaps of the nobility, do not live in houses any larger, or much
+better, than the best of our own; though I think, that one oftener sees
+rooms of a good size and proper elevation, even in these dwellings, than
+it is usual to see in America. But the great houses of London, such as
+Burlington-house, Northumberland-house, Devonshire-house,
+Lansdown-house, Sutherland-house (the most magnificent of all) etc. are,
+more or less, on the continental plan, though not generally built around
+courts. This plan eschews passages of all descriptions, except among the
+private parts of the dwelling. In this respect, an American house is the
+very opposite of a European house. We are nothing without passages, it
+being indispensable that every room should open on one; whereas, here
+the great point is to have as little to do with them as possible. Thus
+you quit the great staircase by a principal door, and find yourself in
+an ante-chamber; this communicates with one or two more rooms of the
+same character, gradually improving in ornaments and fixtures, until you
+enter a _salon_. Then comes a succession of apartments, of greater or
+less magnificence, according to circumstances until you are led entirely
+round the edifice, quitting it by a door on the great staircase again,
+opposite to the one by which you entered. In those cases in which there
+are courts, the principal rooms are ranged in this manner, _en suite_,
+on the exterior range, usually looking out on the gardens, while those
+within them, which look into the court, contain the bed-rooms, boudoir,
+eating-rooms, and perhaps the library. So tenacious are those, who lay
+any claim to gentility here, of the use of the ante-chambers, that I
+scarcely recollect a lodging of any sort, beyond the solitary chamber of
+some student, without, at least, one. They seem indispensable, and I
+think rightly, to all ideas of style, or even of comfort. I remember to
+have seen an amusing instance of the strength of this feeling in the
+case of the wife of a former French minister, at Washington. The
+building she inhabited was one of the ordinary American double houses,
+as they are called, with a passage through the centre, the stairs in the
+passage, and a short corridor, to communicate with the bed-rooms above.
+Off the end of this upper corridor, if, indeed, so short a transverse
+passage deserves the name, was partitioned a room of some eight feet by
+ten, as a bed-room. A room adjoining this, was converted into a boudoir
+and bed-room, for Madame de ----, by means of a silk screen. The usual
+door of the latter opened, of course, on the passage. In a morning call
+one day, I was received in the boudoir. Surprised to be carried up
+stairs on such an occasion, I was still more so to find myself taken
+through a small room, before I was admitted to the larger. The amount of
+it all was; that Madame de ----, accustomed to have many rooms, and to
+think it vulgar to receive in her great drawing-room of a morning,
+believing _au premier_, or up one pair of stairs, more genteel than the
+_rez de chaussée_, or the ground floor, and feeling the necessity of an
+ante-chamber as there was an abruptness in being at once admitted into
+the presence of a lady from a staircase, a sort of local _brusquerie_,
+that would suit her cook better than the wife of an envoy extraordinary,
+had contrived to introduce her guests through the little bed-room, at
+the end of the upstairs entry!
+
+From all this you will be prepared to understand some of the essential
+differences between a reception in Paris and one at New York, or even at
+Washington. The footman, or footmen, if there are two, ascend to the
+inner ante-chamber, with their masters and mistresses, where they
+receive the cloaks, shawls, over-coats, or whatever else has been used
+for the sake of mere warmth, and withdraw. If they are sent home, as is
+usually the case at dinners and evening parties, they return with the
+things at the hour ordered; but if the call be merely a passing one, or
+the guest means to go early to some other house, they either wait in the
+ante-chamber, or in a room provided for that purpose. The French are
+kind to their servants; much kinder than either the English, or their
+humble imitators, ourselves; and it is quite common to see, not only a
+good warm room, but refreshments, provided for the servants at a French
+party. In England, they either crowd the narrow passages and the
+door-way, or throng the street, as with us. In both countries, the poor
+coachmen sit for hours on their carriage-boxes, like so many ducks, in
+the drizzle and rain.
+
+The footman gives the names of his party to the _maître d'hôtel_, or the
+groom of the chambers, who, as he throws open the door of the first
+drawing-room, announces them in a loud voice. Announcing by means of a
+line of servants, is rarely, if ever, practised in France, though it is
+still done in England, at large parties, and in the great houses. Every
+one has heard the story of the attempt at Philadelphia, some forty years
+ago, to introduce the latter custom, when, by the awkwardness of a
+servant, a party was announced as "Master and Mistress, and the young
+ladies;" but you will smile when I tell you that the latter part of this
+style is precisely that which is most in vogue at Paris. A young lady
+here may be admired, she may be danced with, and she may even look and
+be looked at; but in society she talks little, is never loud or
+_belleish_, is always neat and simple in her attire, using very little
+jewelry, and has scarcely any other name than Mademoiselle. The usual
+mode of announcing is, "Monsieur le Comte et Madame la Comtesse d'une
+telle, avec leurs demoiselles;" or, in plain English, "The Count and
+Countess Such-a-one, with their daughters" This you will perceive is not
+so far, after all, from "Master and Mistress, and the young ladies." The
+English, more simple in some respects, and less so in others, usually
+give every name, though, in the use of titles, the utmost good taste is
+observed. Thus every nobleman below a duke is almost uniformly addressed
+and styled Lord A----, Lord B----, etc. and their wives, Ladies A----,
+and B----. Thus the Marquess of Lansdowne would, I think, always be
+addressed and spoken of, and even announced, merely as Lord Lansdowne.
+This, you will observe, is using the simplest possible style, and it
+appears to me that there is rather an affectation of simplicity in their
+ordinary intercourse, the term "My Lord" being hardly ever used, except
+by the tradesmen and domestics. The safest rule for an American, and
+certainly the one that good taste would dictate, is to be very sparing
+in his use of everything of this sort, since he cannot be always certain
+of the proper usages of the different countries he visits, and, so long
+as he avoids unnecessary affectations of republicanisms, and, if a
+gentleman, this he will do without any effort, simplicity is his cue.
+When I say _avoids the affectations of republicanisms_, I do not mean
+the points connected with principles, but those vulgar and underbred
+pretensions of ultra equality and liberalism, which, while they mark
+neither manliness nor a real appreciation of equal rights almost
+uniformly betray a want of proper training and great ignorance of the
+world. Whenever, however, any attempt is made to identify equality of
+rights and democratical institutions with vulgarity and truculency, as
+is sometimes attempted here, in the presence of Americans, and even in
+good company, it is the part of every gentleman of our country to
+improve the opportunity that is thus afforded him, to show it is a
+source of pride with him to belong to a nation in which a hundred men
+are not depressed politically, in order that one may be great; and also
+to show how much advantage, after all, he who is right in substance has
+over him who is substantially wrong, even in the forms of society, and
+in that true politeness which depends on natural justice. Such a
+principle, acted on systematically would soon place the gentlemen of
+America where they ought to be, and the gentlemen of other countries
+where, sooner or later, they must be content to descend, or to change
+their systems. That these things are not so, must be ascribed to our
+provincial habits, our remote situation, comparative insignificance, and
+chiefly to the circumstance that men's minds, trained under a different
+state of things, cannot keep even pace with the wonderful progress of
+the facts of the country.
+
+But all this time I have only got you into the outer _salon_ of a French
+hotel. In order that we may proceed more regularly, we will return to
+the dinner given by our minister to Mr. Canning. Mr. Brown has an
+apartment in the Hotel Monaco, one of the best houses in Paris. The
+Prince of Monaco is the sovereign of a little territory of the same
+name, on the Gulf of Nice, at the foot of the maritime Alps. His states
+may be some six or eight miles square, and the population some six or
+eight thousand. The ancient name of the family is Grimaldi; but by some
+intermarriage or other, the Duke of Valentinois, a Frenchman, has become
+the prince. This little state is still independent, though under the
+especial protection of the King of Sardinia, and without foreign
+relations. It was formerly a common thing for the petty princes of
+Europe to own hotels at Paris. Thus the present Hotel of the Legion of
+Honour was built by a Prince of Salms; and the Princes of Monaco had
+two, one of which is occupied by the Austrian ambassador, and, in the
+other, our own minister, just at this moment, has an apartment. As I had
+been pressed especially to be early, I went a little before six, and
+finding no one in the drawing-room, I strolled into the bureau, where I
+found Mr. Shelden, the secretary of legation, who lived in the family,
+dressed for dinner. We chatted a little, and, on my admiring the
+magnificence of the rooms, he gave me the history of the hotel, as you
+have just heard it, with an additional anecdote, that may be worth
+relating.
+
+"This hotel," said the secretary, "was once owned by M. de Talleyrand,
+and this bureau was probably the receptacle of state secrets of far
+greater importance than any that are connected with our own simple and
+unsupported claims for justice." He then went on to say, that the
+citizens of Hamburg, understanding it was the intention of Napoleon to
+incorporate their town with the empire, had recourse to a _...ceur_,[5]
+in order to prevent an act that, by destroying their neutrality, would
+annihilate their commerce. Four millions of francs were administered on
+this occasion, and of these, a large proportion, it is said, went to pay
+for the Hotel Monaco, which was a recent purchase of M. de Talleyrand.
+To the horror of the Hambourgeois, the money was scarcely paid, when the
+deprecated decree appeared, and every man of them was converted into a
+Frenchman by the stroke of a pen. The worthy burghers were accustomed to
+receive a _quid pro quo_ for every florin they bestowed, failing of
+which, on the present occasion, they sent a deputation forthwith, to
+Napoleon, to reveal the facts, and to make their complaints. That great
+man little liked that any one but himself should peculate in his
+dominions, and, in the end, M. de Talleyrand was obliged to quit the
+Hotel Monaco. By some means with which I am unacquainted, most probably
+by purchase, however, the house is now the property of Madame Adelaide
+of Orleans.
+
+[Footnote 5: the first three letters of the word cannot be correctly
+read on the original book]
+
+The rolling of a coach into the court was a signal for us to be at our
+posts, and we abandoned the bureau so lately occupied by the great
+father of diplomacy, for the drawing-room. I have already told you that
+this dinner was in honour of Mr. Canning, and, although diplomatic in
+one sense, it was not so strictly confined to the corps as to prevent a
+selection. This selection, in honour of the principal guest, had been
+made from the representatives of the great powers, Spain being the least
+important nation represented on the occasion, the republic of
+Switzerland excepted. I do not know whether the presence of the Swiss
+chargé-d'affaires was so intended or not, but it struck me as pointed
+and in good taste, for all the other foreign agents were ambassadors,
+with the exception of the Prussian, who was an Envoy Extraordinary.
+Diplomacy has its honorary gradations as well as a military corps; and,
+as you can know but little of such matters, I will explain them _en
+passant_. First in rank comes the Ambassador. This functionary is
+supposed to represent the personal dignity of the state that sends him.
+If a king, there is a room in his house that has a throne, and it is
+usual to see the chair reversed, in respect for its sanctity; and it
+appears to be etiquette to suspend the portrait of the sovereign beneath
+the canopy. The Envoy Extraordinary comes next, and then the Minister
+Plenipotentiary. Ordinarily, these two functions are united in the same
+individual. Such is the rank of Mr. Brown. The Minister Resident is a
+lower grade, and the Chargé-d'affaires the lowest of all. _Inter se_,
+these personages take rank according to this scale. Previously to the
+peace of 1814, the representative of one monarch laid claim to precede
+the representative of another, always admitting, however, of the
+validity of the foregoing rule. This pretension gave rise to a good deal
+of heartburning and contention. Nothing can, in itself, be of greater
+indifference whether A. or B. walk into the reception-room or to the
+dinner-table first; but when the idea of general superiority is
+associated with the act, the aspect of the thing is entirely changed.
+Under the old system, the ambassador of the Emperor, claimed precedence
+over all other ambassadors, and, I believe, the representatives of the
+kings of France had high pretensions also. Now there are great mutations
+in states. Spain, once the most important kingdom of Europe, has much
+less influence to-day than Prussia, a power of yesterday. Then the
+minister of the most insignificant prince claimed precedency over the
+representative of the most potent republic. This might have passed while
+republics were insignificant and dependent; but no one can believe that
+a minister of America, for instance, representing a state of fifty
+millions, as will be the case before long, would submit to such an
+extravagant pretension on the part of a minister of Wurtemburg, or
+Sardinia, or Portugal. He would not submit to such a pretension on the
+part of the minister of any power on earth.
+
+I do not believe that the Congress of Vienna had sufficient foresight,
+or sufficient knowledge of the actual condition of the United States, to
+foresee this difficulty; but there were embarrassing points to be
+settled among the European states themselves, and the whole affair was
+disposed of on a very discreet and equitable principle. It was decided
+that priority of standing at a particular court should regulate the rank
+between the different classes of agents at that particular court. Thus
+the ambassador longest at Paris precedes all the other ambassadors at
+Paris; and the same rule prevails with the ministers and chargés,
+according to their respective gradations of rank. A provision, however,
+was made in favour of the representative of the Pope, who, if of the
+rank of a nuncio, precedes all ambassadors. The concession has been made
+in honour of the church, which, as you must know, or ought to be told,
+is an interest much protected in all monarchies, statesmen being
+notoriously of tender consciences.
+
+The constant habit of meeting drills the diplomatic corps so well, that
+they go through the evolutions of etiquette as dexterously as a corps of
+regular troops perform their wheelings and countermarches. The first
+great point with them is punctuality; for, to people who sacrifice so
+much of it to forms, time gets to be precious. The roll of wheels was
+incessant in the court of the Hotel Monaco, from the time the first
+carriage entered until the last had set down its company. I know, as
+every man who reflects must know, that it is inherently ill-bred to be
+late anywhere; but I never before felt how completely it was high
+breeding to be as punctual as possible. The _maître d'hôtel_ had as much
+as he could do to announce the company, who entered as closely after
+each other as decorum and dignity would permit. I presume one party
+waited a little for the others in the outer drawing-room, the reception
+being altogether in the inner room.
+
+The Americans very properly came first. We were Mr. Gallatin, who was
+absent from London on leave, his wife and daughter, and a clergyman and
+his wife, and myself; Mrs. ---- having declined the invitation on account
+of ill health. The announcing and the entrance of most of the company,
+especially as everybody was in high dinner-dress, the women in jewels
+and the men wearing all their orders, had something of the air of a
+scenic display. The effect was heightened by the magnificence of the
+hotel, the drawing-room in which we were collected being almost regal.
+
+The first person who appeared was a handsome, compact, well-built,
+gentleman-like little man, who was announced as the Duke of Villa
+Hermosa, the Spanish ambassador. He was dressed with great simplicity
+and beauty, having, however, the breast of his coat covered with stars,
+among which I recognized, with historical reverence, that of the Golden
+Fleece. He came alone, his wife pleading indisposition for her absence.
+The Prussian minister and his wife came next. Then followed Lord and
+Lady Granville, the representatives of England. He was a large,
+well-looking man, but wanted the perfect command of movement and manner
+that so much distinguish his brethren in diplomacy: as for mere physical
+stuff, he and our own minister, who stands six feet four in his
+stockings, would make material enough for all the rest of the corps. He
+wore the star of the Bath. The Austrian ambassador and ambassadress
+followed, a couple of singularly high air, and a good tone of manner. He
+is a Hungarian, and very handsome; she a Veronese, I believe, and
+certainly a woman admirably adapted for her station. They had hardly
+made their salutations before M. le Comte et Mad. la Comtesse de Villèle
+were announced. Here, then, we had the French prime minister. As the
+women precede the men into a drawing-room here, knowing how to walk and
+to curtsey alone, I did not, at first, perceive the great man, who
+followed so close to his wife's skirts as to be nearly hid. But he was
+soon flying about the room at large, and betrayed himself immediately to
+be a fidget. Instead of remaining stationary, or nearly so as became his
+high quality, he took the initiative in compliments, and had nearly
+every diplomatic man walking apart in the adjoining room, in a political
+aside, in less than twenty minutes. He had a countenance of shrewdness,
+and I make little doubt is a better man in a bureau than in a
+drawing-room. His colleague, the foreign minister, M. de Damas, and his
+wife, came next. He was a large, heavy-looking personage, that I suspect
+throws no small part of the diplomacy on the shoulders of the premier;
+though he had more the manner of good society than his colleague. He has
+already exchanged his office for that of governor of the heir
+presumptive, as I have already stated. There was a pause, when a quiet,
+even-paced, classical-looking man, in the attire of an ecclesiastic,
+appeared in the door, and was announced as "My Lord the Nuncio." He was
+then an archbishop, and wore the usual dress of his rank; but I have
+since met him at an evening party with a red hat; under his arm, the
+Pope having recalled him, and raised him to that dignity. He is now
+Cardinal Macchi. He was a priestly and an intellectual-looking
+personage, and, externals considered, well suited to his station. He
+wore a decoration or two, as well as most of the others.
+
+"My Lord Clanricarde and Mr. Canning" came next, and the great man,
+followed by his son-in-law, made his appearance. He walked into the room
+with the quiet _aplomb_ of a man accustomed to being _lionised_; and
+certainly, without being of striking, he was of very pleasing
+appearance. His size was ordinary, but his frame was compact and well
+built, neither too heavy nor too light for his years, but of just the
+proportions to give one the idea of a perfect management of the machine.
+His face was agreeable, and his eye steady and searching. He and M. de
+Villèle were the very opposites in demeanour, though, after all, it was
+easy to see that the Englishman had the most latent force about him. One
+was fidgety, and the other humorous; for, with all his command of limb
+and gesture, nothing could be more natural than the expression of Mr.
+Canning, I may have imagined that I detected some of his wit, from a
+knowledge of the character of his mind. He left the impression, however,
+of a man whose natural powers were checked by a trained and factitious
+deference to the rank of those with whom he associated. Lord Granville,
+I thought, treated him with a sort of affectionate deference; and, right
+or wrong, I jumped to the conclusion, that the English ambassador was a
+straight-forward, good fellow at the bottom, and one very likely to
+badger the fidgetty premier, by his steady determination to do what was
+right. I thought M. de Damas, too, looked like an honest man. God
+forgive me, if I do injustice to any of these gentlemen!
+
+All this time, I have forgotten Count Pozzo di Borgo, the Russian
+ambassador. Being a bachelor, he came alone. It might have been fancy,
+but I thought he appeared more at his ease under the American roof than
+any of his colleagues. The perfect good understanding between our own
+government and that of Russia extends to their representatives, and,
+policy or not, we are better treated by them than by any other foreign
+ministers. This fact should be known and appreciated, for as one citizen
+of the republic, however insignificant, I have no notion of being
+blackguarded and vituperated half a century, and then cajoled into
+forgetfulness, at the suggestions of fear and expediency, as
+circumstances render our good-will of importance. Let us at least show
+that we are not mannikins to be pulled about for the convenience and
+humours of others, but that we know what honest words are, understand
+the difference between civility and abuse, and have pride enough to
+resent contumely, when, at least, we feel it to be unmerited. M. Pozzo
+is a handsome man, of good size and a fine dark eye, and has a greater
+reputation for talents than any other member of the diplomatic corps now
+at Paris. He is by birth a Corsican, and, I have heard it said,
+distantly related to Bonaparte. This may be true, Corsica being so small
+a country; just as some of us are related to everybody in West Jersey.
+Our party now consisted of the prime minister, the secretary of foreign
+affairs, the Austrian and English ambassadors, and the Prussian
+minister, with their wives,--the Nuncio, the Russian and Spanish
+ambassadors, the Swiss chargé-d'affaires, Mr. Canning, Lord Clanricarde,
+--Mr. Mrs. and Miss Gallatin, and the other Americans already mentioned,
+or twenty-five in all.
+
+If I had been struck with the rapid and business-like manner in which
+the company entered, I was amused with the readiness with which they
+paired off when dinner was announced. It was like a _coup de théâtre_,
+every man and woman knowing his or her exact rank and precedency, and
+the time when to move. This business of getting out of a drawing-room to
+a dinner-table is often one of difficulty, though less frequently in
+France than in most other European countries, on account of the
+admirable tact of the women, who seldom suffer a knotty point to get the
+ascendancy, but, by choosing the gentlemen for themselves, settle the
+affair off hand. From their decision, of course, there is no appeal. In
+order that in your simplicity you may not mistake the importance of this
+moment, I will relate an anecdote of what lately occurred at a dinner
+given by an English functionary in Holland.
+
+When William invaded England, in 1688, he took with him many Dutch
+nobles, some of whom remained, and became English peers. Among others,
+he created one of his followers an Irish earl; but choosing to return to
+Holland, this person was afterwards known as the Count de ----, although
+his Irish rank was always acknowledged. It happened that the wife of the
+descendant of this person was present at the entertainment in question.
+When dinner was announced, the company remarked that the master of the
+house was in a dilemma. There was much consultation, and a delay of near
+half an hour before the matter was decided. The debated point was,
+whether Madame de ---- was to be considered as a Dutch or an Irish
+countess. If the latter, there were English ladies present who were
+entitled to precede her; if the former, as a stranger, she might get
+that advantage herself. Luckily for the rights of hospitality, the Dutch
+lady got the best of it.
+
+These things sound absurd, and sometimes they are so; but this social
+drilling, unless carried to extremes, is not without its use. In
+America, I have always understood that, on such occasions, silent laws
+of etiquette exist in all good company, which are founded on propriety
+and tact. The young give way to the old, the undistinguished to the
+distinguished, and he who is at home to the stranger. These rules are
+certainly the most rational, and in the best taste, when they can be
+observed, and, on the whole, they lead perhaps to the fewest
+embarrassments; always so, if there happen to be none but the well-bred
+present, since seats become of little consideration where no importance
+is attached to them. I confess to some manoeuvring in my time, to get
+near, or away from a fire, out of a draught, or next some agreeable
+woman; but the idea whether I was at the head or the foot of the table
+never crossed my mind: and yet here, where they do mean the salt to come
+into the account, I begin to take care that they do not "bite their
+thumbs" at me. Two or three little things have occurred in my presence,
+which show that all our people do not even understand the ways of their
+own good society. A very young man lately, under the impression that
+gallantry required it, led one of the most distinguished women in the
+room to the table, merely because he happened to be next her, at the
+moment dinner was announced. This was certainly a failure even in
+American etiquette, every woman being more disposed to appreciate the
+delicacy and respect which should have induced such a person to give
+place to one of higher claims, than to prize the head-over-heels
+assiduity that caused the boy to forget himself. Sentiment should be the
+guide on such occasions, and no man is a gentleman until his habits are
+brought completely in subjection to its dictates, in all matters of this
+sort.
+
+There was very little sentiment, however, in marshalling the company at
+the dinner given to Mr. Canning. I will not undertake to say that all
+the guests were invited to meet this gentleman, and that he had been
+asked to name a day, as is usual when it is intended to pay an especial
+compliment; but I was asked to meet him, and I understood that the
+dinner was in his honour. Diplomatic etiquette made short work of the
+matter, notwithstanding, for the doors were hardly thrown open, before
+all the privileged vanished, with a quickness that was surprising. The
+minister took Madame de Villèle; M. de Villèle, Mrs. Brown; M. de Damas,
+the wife of the oldest ambassador; and the Nuncio, Madame de Damas:
+after which, the ambassadors and ministers took each other's wives in
+due order, and with a promptitude that denoted great practice. Even the
+charge disappeared, leaving the rest of us to settle matters among
+ourselves as well as we could. Mr. Canning, Mr. Gallatin, Lord
+Clanricarde, the divine, the secretary, and myself, were left with only
+the wife of the clergyman and Miss Gallatin. As a matter of course, the
+Americans, feeling themselves at home, made signs for the two Englishmen
+to precede them, and Mr. Canning offered his arm to Mrs. ----, and Lord
+Clanricarde, his to Miss Gallatin. Here occurred a touch of character
+that is worthy to be mentioned, as showing of how very little account an
+American, male or female, is in the estimation of a European, and how
+very arbitrary are the laws of etiquette among our English cousins. Mr.
+Canning actually gave way to his son-in-law, leaving the oldest of the
+two ladies to come after the youngest, because, as a marquis, his
+son-in-law took precedence of a commoner! This was out of place in
+America, at least, where the parties were, by a fiction in law, if not
+in politeness, and it greatly scandalized all our Yankee notions of
+propriety. Mrs. ---- afterwards told me that he apologized for the
+circumstance, giving Lord Clanricarde's rank as the reason.
+"_Sempereadem_," or "worse and worse," as my old friend O----n used to
+translate it. What became of the precedency of the married lady all this
+time? you will be ready to ask. Alas! she was an American, and had no
+precedency. The twelve millions may not settle this matter as it should
+be; but, take my word for it, the "fifty millions" will. Insignificant as
+all this is, or rather ought to be, your grandchildren and mine will
+live to see the mistake rectified. How much better would it be for those
+who cannot stop the progress of events, by vain wishes and idle regrets,
+to concede the point gracefully, and on just principles, than to have
+their cherished prejudices broken down by dint of sheer numbers and
+power!
+
+The dinner itself was, like every dinner that is given at Paris,
+beautiful in decoration, admirable in its order, and excellent in
+viands, or rather, in its dishes; for it is the cookery and not the
+staple articles that form the boast of the French kitchen. As you are
+notable in your own region for understanding these matters, I must say a
+word touching the gastric science as it is understood here. A general
+error exists in America on the subject of French cookery, which is not
+highly seasoned, but whose merit consists in blending flavours and in
+arranging compounds, in such a manner as to produce, at the same time,
+the lightest and most agreeable food. A lady who, from her public
+situation, receives once a week, for the entire year, and whose table
+has a reputation, assured me lately, that all the spices consumed
+annually in her kitchen did not cost her a franc. The _effect_ of a
+French dinner is its principal charm. One of reasonably moderate habits,
+rises from the table with a sense of enjoyment, that, to a stranger, at
+least, is sometimes startling. I have, on several occasions, been afraid
+I was relaxing into the vices of a _gourmet_, if, indeed, vices they can
+be called. The _gourmand_ is a beast, and there is nothing to be said in
+his favour; but, after all, I incline to the opinion that no one is the
+worse for a knowledge of what is agreeable to the palate. Perhaps no one
+of either sex is thoroughly trained, or properly bred, without being
+_tant soit peu de gourmet_. The difference between sheer eating, and
+eating with tact and intelligence, is so apparent as to need no
+explanation. A dinner here does not oppress one. The wine neither
+intoxicates nor heats, and the frame of mind and body in which one is
+left, is precisely that best suited to intellectual and social
+pleasures. I make no doubt, that one of the chief causes of the French
+being so agreeable as companions, is, in a considerable degree, owing to
+the admirable qualities of their table. A national character may emanate
+from a kitchen. Roast beef, bacon, pudding, and beer, and port, will
+make a different man, in time, from Chateau Margau, _côtelettes_,
+_consommés_, and _soufflés_. The very name of _vol au vent_ is enough to
+make one walk on air!
+
+Seriously, these things have more influence than may be, at a glance,
+imagined. The first great change I could wish to make in America, would
+be to see a juster appreciation of the substance, and less importance
+attached to outward forms, in moral things. The second would be, to
+create a standard of greatness and distinction that should be
+independent, or nearly independent, of money. The next, a more reasoning
+and original tone of thought as respects our own distinctive principles
+and _distinctive situation_, with a total indifference to the theories
+that have been broached to sustain an alien and an antagonist system, in
+England; and the last (the climax), a total reform in the kitchen! If I
+were to reverse the order of these improvements, I am not certain the
+three last might not follow as a consequence of the first. After our
+people have been taught to cook a dinner, they ought also to be taught
+how to eat it.
+
+Our entertainment lasted the usual hour and a half; and, as one is all
+this time eating, and there are limits to the capacity of a stomach, a
+part of the lightness and gaiety with which one rises from a French
+dinner ought to be attributed to the time that is consumed at the table.
+The different ingredients have opportunity to dispose of themselves in
+their new abode, and are not crowded together pell-mell, or like papers
+and books in ---- library, as I think they must be after a transatlantic
+meal. As for the point of a mere consumption of food, I take it the palm
+must be given to your Frenchman. I had some amusement to-day in watching
+the different countries. The Americans were nearly all through their
+dinner by the time the first course was removed. All that was eaten
+afterwards was literally, with them, pure makeweight, though they kept a
+hungry look to the last. The English seemed fed even before the dinner
+was begun; and, although the continental powers in general had the art
+of picking till they got to the finger-bowls, none really kept up the
+ball but the Frenchmen. It happened to be Friday, and I was a little
+curious to discover whether the Nuncio came to these places with a
+dispensation in his pocket. He sat next to Madame de Damas, as good a
+Catholic as himself, and I observed them helping themselves to several
+suspicious-looking dishes during the first course. I ought to have told
+you before, that one rarely, almost never, helps his neighbour, at a
+French entertainment. The dishes are usually put on the table, removed
+by the servants to be carved in succession, and handed to the guests to
+help themselves. When the service is perfect, every dish is handed to
+each guest. In the great houses, servants out of livery help to the
+different _plats_, servants in livery holding the dishes, sauces, etc.,
+and changing the plates. I believe it is strictly _haut ton_ for the
+servants in livery to do nothing but assist those out of livery. In
+America it is thought stylish to give liveries; in Europe those who keep
+most servants out of livery are in the highest mode, since these are
+always a superior class of menials. The habits of this quarter of the
+world give servants a very different estimation from that which they
+hold with us. Nobles of high rank are employed about the persons of
+princes; and, although, in this age, they perform no strictly menial
+offices, or only on great occasions, they are, in theory, the servitors
+of the body. Nobles have been even employed by nobles; and it is still
+considered an honour for the child of a physician, or a clergyman, or a
+shopkeeper, in some parts of Europe, to fill a high place in the
+household of a great noble. The body servant, or the _gentleman_, as he
+is sometimes called even in England, of a man of rank, looks down upon a
+mechanic as his inferior. Contrary to all our notions as all this is, it
+is strictly reasonable, when the relative conditions, information,
+habits, and characters of the people are considered. But servants here
+are divided into many classes; for some are scullions, and some are
+entrusted with the keys. It follows that those who maintain most of the
+higher class, who are never in livery, maintain the highest style. To
+say, he keeps a servant out of livery, means, that he keeps a better
+sort of domestic. Mere footmen always wear it; the _maître d'hôtel_, or
+groom of the chambers, and the valet, never.
+
+But to return to the dispensation, I made it a point to taste every dish
+that had been partaken of by the Nuncio and his neighbour; and I found
+that they were all fish; but fish so treated, that they could hardly
+know what to think of themselves. You may remember, however, that an
+Archbishop of Paris was sufficiently complaisant to declare a particular
+duck, of which one of Louis the Sixteenth's aunts was fond, to be fish,
+and, of course, fit to be eaten on fast-days.
+
+The fasting of these people would strike you as singular; for I verily
+believe they eat more of a fast-day than on any other. We engaged a
+governess for the girls not long after our arrival, and she proved to be
+a bigoted Catholic, a furious royalist, and as ignorant as a calf. She
+had been but a few weeks in the house, when I detected her teaching her
+_élèves_ to think Washington an unpardonable rebel, La Fayette a
+monster, Louis XVI. a martyr, and all heretics in the high road to
+damnation. There remained no alternative but to give her a quarter's
+salary, and to get rid of her. By the way, this woman was of a noble
+family, and as such received a small pension from the court. But I kept
+her fully a month longer than I think I otherwise should, to see her eat
+on fast-days. Your aunt had the consideration invariably to order fish
+for her, and she made as much havoc among them as a pike. She always
+commenced the Friday with an extra allowance of fruit, which she was
+eating all the morning; and at dinner she contrived to eat half the
+vegetables and all the fish. One day, by mistake, the soup happened to
+be _gras_ instead of _maigre_, and, after she had swallowed a large
+plateful, I was malicious enough to express my regrets at the mistake. I
+really thought the poor woman was about to disgorge on the spot; but by
+dint of consolation she managed to spare us this scene. So good an
+occasion offering, I ventured to ask her why she fasted at all, as I did
+not see it made any great difference in the sum total of her bodily
+nutriment. She assured me that I did not understand the matter. The
+fruit was merely a "_rafraîchissant_" and so counted for nothing; and as
+for the fish and vegetables, I might possibly think them very good
+eating, and, for that matter, so did she, on Thursdays and Saturdays;
+but no sooner did Friday come than she longed for meat. The merit of the
+thing consisted, therefore, more in denying her appetite than in going
+without food. I tried hard to persuade her to take a _côtelette_ with
+me; but the proposition made her shudder, though she admitted that she
+envied me every mouthful I swallowed. The knowledge of this craving did
+not take away my appetite.
+
+Lest you should suppose that I am indulging in the vulgar English slang
+against French governesses, I will add, that our own was the very worst,
+in every respect, I ever saw, in or out of France; and that I have met
+with ladies in this situation every way qualified, by principles,
+attainments, manners, and antecedents, to be received with pleasure in
+the best company of Europe.
+
+Our _connives_ in the Hotel Monaco soon disappeared after the
+_chasse-café_, leaving none but the Americans behind them. Men and women
+retired as they came; the latter, however, taking leave, as is always
+required by the punctilios of your sex, except at very large and crowded
+parties, and even then properly; and the former, if alone, getting away
+as quietly as possible. The whole affair was over before nine o'clock,
+at which hour the diplomatic corps was scattered all through Paris.
+
+Previously to this dispersion, however, Mr. Gallatin did me the favour
+to present me to Mr. Canning. The conversation was short, and was
+chiefly on America. There was a sore part in his feelings in consequence
+of a recent negotiation, and he betrayed it. He clearly does not love
+us; but what Englishman does? You will be amused to hear that,
+unimportant in other respects as this little conversation was, it has
+been the means of affecting the happiness of two individuals of high
+station in Great Britain. It would be improper for me to say more; but
+of the fact I can entertain no manner of doubt, and I mention it here
+merely as a curious instance of the manner in which "tall oaks from
+little acorns grow."
+
+I ought to have said that two, instead of one event, followed this
+dinner. The second was our own introduction into European society. The
+how and wherefore it is unnecessary to explain, but some of the
+cleverest and best-bred people of this well-bred and clever capital took
+us by the hand, all "unlettered" as we were, and from that moment,
+taking into consideration our tastes and my health, the question has
+been, not how to get into, but how to keep out of, the great world. You
+know enough of these matters, to understand that, the ice once broken,
+any one can float in the current of society.
+
+This little footing has not been obtained without some _contretems_, and
+I have learned early to understand that wherever there is an Englishman
+in the question, it behoves an American to be reserved, punctilious, and
+sometimes stubborn. There is a strange mixture of kind feeling,
+prejudice, and ill-nature, as respects us, wrought into the national
+character of that people, that will not admit of much mystification.
+That they should not like us, may be natural enough; but if they seek
+the intercourse, they ought, on all occasions, to be made to conduct it
+equally, without annoyance and condescension and on terms of perfect
+equality; conditions, by the way, that are scarcely agreeable to their
+present notions of superiority.[6]
+
+[Footnote 6: The change in this respect during the last ten years is
+_patent_. No European nation has, probably, just at this moment as much
+real respect for America as the English, though it is still mixed with
+great ignorance, and a very sincere dislike. Still, the enterprise,
+activity, and growing power of the country are forcing themselves on the
+attention of our kinsmen; and if the government understood its foreign
+relations as well as it does its domestic, and made a proper exhibition
+of maritime preparation and of maritime force, this people would hold
+the balance in many of the grave questions that are now only in abeyance
+in European politics. Hitherto we have been influenced by every
+vacillation in English interests, and it is quite time to think of
+turning the tables, and of placing, as far as practicable, American
+interests above the vicissitudes of those of other people. The thing is
+more easily done than is commonly imagined, but a party politician is
+rarely a statesman, the subordinate management necessary to the one
+being death to the comprehensive views that belong to the other. The
+peculiar nature of the American institutions, and the peculiar
+geographical situation of the country, moreover, render higher qualities
+necessary, perhaps, to make a statesman here than elsewhere.]
+
+In order to understand why I mention any other than the French, in the
+capital of France, you will remember that there are many thousands of
+foreigners established here, for longer or shorter periods, who, by means
+of their money (a necessary that, relatively, is less abundant with the
+French), materially affect society, contriving to penetrate it in all
+directions, in some way or other.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER VII.
+
+English Jurisprudence.--English Justice.--Justice in
+France.--Continental Jurisprudence.--Juries.--Legal Injustice.--The Bar
+in France.--Precedence of the Law.
+
+
+To JACOB SUTHERLAND, ESQ. NEW YORK.
+
+Your legal pursuits will naturally give you an interest in the subject
+of the state of justice in this part of the world. A correspondence like
+mine would not admit of any very profound analysis of the subject, did I
+possess the necessary learning, which I do not, but I may present a few
+general facts and notions, that will give you some idea of the state of
+this important feature of society. The forms and modes of English
+jurisprudence are so much like our own, as to create the impression that
+the administration of justice is equally free from venality and favour.
+As a whole and when the points at issue reach the higher functionaries
+of the law, I should think this opinion true; but, taking those facts
+that appear in the daily prints, through the police reports and in the
+form of personal narratives, as guides, I should think that there is
+much more oppression, many more abuses, and far more outrages on the
+intention of the law, in the purlieus of the courts in England, through
+the agency of subordinates, than with us. The delays and charges of a
+suit in chancery almost amount to a denial of justice. Quite lately, I
+saw a statement, which went to show that a legacy to a charity of about
+1000_l_., with the interest of some fourteen years, had been consumed in
+this court, with the exception of rather more than 100_l_. This is an
+intolerable state of things, and goes to prove, I think, that, in some
+of its features at least, English jurisprudence is behind that of every
+other free country.
+
+But I have been much impressed lately, by a case that would be likely to
+escape the attention of more regular commentators. A peer of the realm
+having struck a constable on a race-course, is proceeded against, in the
+civil action. The jury found for the plaintiff, damages fifty pounds. In
+summing up, the judge reasoned exactly contrary to what I am inclined to
+think would have been the case had the matter been tried before you. He
+gave it as his opinion that the action was frivolous, and ought never to
+have been brought; that the affair should have been settled out of
+court; and, in short, left the impression that it was not, as such, so
+great a hardship for a constable to be struck by a peer, that his honour
+might not be satisfied with the offering of a guinea or two. The jury
+thought differently; from which I infer that the facts did not sustain
+the judge in his notions. Now, the reasoning at home would, I think,
+have been just the other way. The English judge said, in substance, a
+man of Lord ----'s dignity ought not to have been exposed to this
+action; you would have said, a senator is a law-maker, and owes even a
+higher example of order than common to the community; _he_ insinuated
+that a small reparation ought to suffice, while _you_ would have made
+some strong hints at smart-money.
+
+I mention this case, for I think it rather illustrative of English
+justice. Indeed, it is not easy to see how it well can be otherwise:
+when society is divided into castes, the weak must go to the wall. I
+know that the theory here is quite different, and that one of the boasts
+of England is the equality of its justice; but I am dealing in _facts_,
+and not in theories. In America it is thought, and with proper
+limitations I dare say justly, that the bias of juries, in the very
+lowest courts, is in favour of the poor against the rich; but the right
+of appeal restores the balance, and, in a great degree, secures justice.
+In each case it is the controlling power that does the wrong; in England
+the few, in America the many.
+
+In France, as you probably know, juries are confined to criminal cases.
+The consequence is, a continuance of the old practice of soliciting
+justice. The judge virtually decides in chambers, and he hears the
+parties in chambers, or, in other words, wherever he may choose to
+receive them. The client depends as much on external influence and his
+own solicitations, as on the law and the justice of his case. He visits
+the judge officially, and works upon his mind by all the means in his
+power. You and I have been acquainted intimately from boyhood, and it
+has been my bad luck to have had more to do with the courts than I could
+wish; and yet, in all the freedom of an otherwise unfettered
+intercourse, I have never dared to introduce the subject of any suit in
+which I have been a party. I have been afraid of wounding your sense of
+right, to say nothing of my own, and of forfeiting your esteem, or at
+least, of losing your society. Now had we been Frenchmen, you would have
+expected me to _solicit_ you; you would probably have heard me with the
+bias of an old friend; and my adversary must have been a singularly
+lucky fellow, or you a very honest one, if he did not get the worst of
+it, supposing the case to admit of doubt. Formerly, it was known that
+influence prevailed; bribes were offered and received, and a suit was a
+contest of money and favouritism rather than one of facts and
+principles.
+
+I asked General La Fayette not long since, what he thought of the actual
+condition of France as respects the administration of justice. In most
+political cases he accused the government of the grossest injustice,
+illegality, and oppression. In the ordinary criminal cases he believed
+the intentions of the courts and juries perfectly fair, as, indeed, it
+is difficult to believe they should not be. In the civil suits he
+thought a great improvement had taken place; nor did he believe that
+there now exists much of the ancient corruption. The civil code of
+Napoleon had worked well, and all he complained of was a want of fitness
+between the subordinate provisions of a system invented by a military
+despot for his own support, and the system of _quasi_ liberty that had
+been adopted at the restoration; for the Bourbons had gladly availed
+themselves of all the machinery of power that Napoleon bequeathed to
+France.
+
+A gentleman who heard the conversation afterwards told me the following
+anecdote. A friend of his had long been an unsuccessful suitor in one of
+the higher courts of the kingdom. They met one day in the street, when
+the other told him that an unsealed letter, which he held in his hand,
+contained an offer of a pair of carriage-horses to the wife of the judge
+who had the control of his affair. On being told he dare not take so
+strong a step, M. de ----, my informant, was requested to read the
+letter, to seal it and to put it in the _boîte aux lettres_ with his own
+hands, in order to satisfy himself of the actual state of justice in
+France. All this was done, and "I can only add," continued M. de ----,
+"that I afterwards saw the horses in the carriage of Madame ----, and
+that my friend gained his cause." To this anecdote I can only say, I
+tell it exactly as I heard it, and that M. de ---- is a deputy, and one
+of the honestest and simplest-minded men of my acquaintance. It is but
+proper to add, that the judge in question has a bad name, and is little
+esteemed by the bar; but the above-mentioned fact would go to show that
+too much of the old system remains.
+
+In Germany justice bears a better name, though the absence of juries
+generally must subject the suitor to the assaults of personal influence.
+Farther south, report speaks still less favourably of the manner in
+which the laws are interpreted; and, indeed, it would seem to be an
+inevitable consequence of despotism that justice should be abused. One
+hears occasionally of some signal act of moderation and equity on the
+part of monarchies, but the merits of systems are to be proved, not by
+these brilliant _coups de justice_, but by the steady, quiet and regular
+working of the machine, on which men know how to calculate, in which
+they have faith, and which as seldom deceives them as comports with
+human fallibility, rather than by _scenes_ in which the blind goddess is
+made to play a part in a _melodrama_.
+
+On the whole, it is fair to presume that, while public opinion, and that
+intelligence which acts virtually as a bill of rights, even in the most
+despotic governments of Europe, not even excepting Turkey, perhaps, have
+produced a beneficial influence on the courts, the secrecy of their
+proceedings, the irresponsible nature of their trusts (responsible to
+power, and irresponsible to the nation), and the absence of publicity,
+produce precisely the effects that a common-sense view of the facts
+would lead one who understands human nature to expect.
+
+I am no great admirer of the compromising verdicts of juries, in civil
+suits that admit of a question as to amounts. They are an admirable
+invention to settle questions of guilty or not guilty, but an
+enlightened court would, nine times in ten, do more justice in the cases
+just named. Would it not be an improvement to alter the present powers
+of juries, by letting them simply find for or against the suitor,
+leaving the damages to be assessed by regular officers, that might
+resemble masters in chancery? At all events, juries, or some active
+substitute, cannot be safely dispensed with until a people have made
+great progress in the science of publicity, and in a knowledge of the
+general principles connected with jurisprudence.
+
+This latter feature is quite peculiar to America. Nothing has struck me
+more in Europe than the ignorance which everywhere exists on such
+subjects, even among educated people. No one appears to have any
+distinct notions of legal principles, or even of general law, beyond a
+few prominent facts, but the professional men. Chance threw me, not long
+since into the company of three or four exceedingly clever young
+Englishmen. They were all elder sons, and two were the heirs of
+peers.[7] Something was said on the subject of a claim of a gentleman
+with whom I am connected to a large Irish estate. The grandfather of
+this gentleman was the next brother to the incumbent, who died
+intestate. The grandson, however, was defeated in his claim, in
+consequence of its being proved, that the ancestor through whom he
+derived his claim was of the half-blood. My English companions did not
+understand the principle, and when, I explained by adding, that the
+grandfather of the claimant was born of a different mother from the
+last holder in fee, and that he could never inherit at law (unless by
+devise), the estate going to a hundredth cousin of the whole blood in
+preference, or even escheating to the king, they one and all protested
+England had no such law! They were evidently struck with the injustice
+of transferring property that had been acquired by the common ancestor
+of two brothers to a remote cousin, merely because the affinity between
+the sons was only on the father's side although that very father may
+have accumulated the estate; and they could not believe that what struck
+them as so grievous a wrong, could be the law of descents under which
+they lived. Luckily for me, one learned in the profession happened to be
+present, and corroborated the fact. Now all these gentlemen were members
+of parliament; but they were accustomed to leave legal questions of this
+nature to the management of professional men.
+
+[Footnote 7: This absurd and unaccountable provision of the common law
+has since been superseded by a statute regulating descents on a more
+intelligible and just provision. England has made greater advances in
+common sense and in the right, in all such matters, within the last five
+years, than during the previous hundred.]
+
+I mentioned this conversation to another Englishman, who thought the
+difficulty well disposed of by saying, that if property ever escheated
+in this manner, I ought to remember, that the crown invariably bestowed
+it on the natural heir. This struck me as singular reasoning to be used
+by a people who profess to cherish liberty, inasmuch as, to a certain
+degree, it places all the land in the kingdom at the mercy of the
+sovereign. I need not tell you, moreover, that this answer was
+insufficient, as it did not meet the contingency of a remote cousin's
+inheriting to the prejudice of the children of him who earned the
+estate. But habit is all in all with the English in such matters; and
+that which they are accustomed to see and hear, they are accustomed to
+think right.
+
+The bar is rising greatly in public consideration in France. Before the
+revolution there were certain legal families of great distinction; but
+these could scarcely be considered as forming a portion of the regular
+practitioners. Now, many of the most distinguished statesmen, peers, and
+politicians of France, commenced their careers as advocates. The
+practice of public speaking gives them an immense advantage in the
+chambers, and fully half of the most popular debaters are members who
+belong to the profession. New candidates for public favour appear every
+day, and the time is at hand when the fortunes of France, so lately
+controlled by soldiers, will be more influenced by men of this
+profession than by those of all the others. This is a great step in
+moral civilization; for the country that most feels the ascendancy of
+the law, and that least feels that of arms, is nearest to the summit of
+human perfection. When asked which profession takes rank in America, I
+tell them the law in influence, and the church in deference. Some of my
+moustachoed auditors stare at this reply; for here the sword has
+precedence of all others, and the law, with few exceptions, is deemed a
+calling for none but those who are in the secondary ranks of society.
+But, as I have told you, opinion is undergoing a great change in this
+particular. I believe that every efficient man in the present ministry
+is, or has been, a lawyer.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER VIII.
+
+Army of France.--Military Display.--Fête of the Trocadero.--Royal Review.
+--Royal Ordinance.--Dissatisfaction.--Hostile Demonstration.--Dispersion
+of Rioters.--French Cavalry.--Learned Coachman.--Use of Cavalry.--Cavalry
+Operations.--The Conscription.--National Defence.--Napoleon's Marshals.
+--Marshal Soult--Disaffection of the Army.
+
+
+To COL. BANKHEAD, U.S. ARTILLERY.
+
+The army of France obtained so high a reputation, during the wars of the
+revolution and the empire, that you may feel some curiosity to know its
+actual condition. As the Bourbons understand that they have been
+restored to the throne, by the great powers of Europe, if not in
+opposition to the wishes of a majority of Frenchmen, certainly in
+opposition to the wishes of the active portion of the population, and
+consequently to that part of the nation which would be most likely to
+oppose their interests, they have been accused of endeavouring to keep
+the establishments of France so low as to put her at the mercy of any
+new combination of the allies. I should think this accusation, in a
+great degree, certainly unmerited; for France, at this moment, has a
+large and, so far as I can judge, a well-appointed army, and one that is
+charged by the liberal party with being a heavy expense to the nation,
+and that, too, chiefly with the intention of keeping the people in
+subjection to tyranny. But these contradictions are common in party
+politics. It is not easy here to get at statistical facts accurately,
+especially those which are connected with expenditure. Nominally, the
+army is about 200,000 men, but it is whispered that numerous _congés_
+are given, in order to divert the funds that are thus saved to other
+objects. Admitting all this to be true, and it probably is so in part, I
+should think France must have fully 150,000 men embodied, without
+including the National Guards. Paris is pretty well garrisoned, and the
+_casernes_ in the vicinity of the capital are always occupied. It
+appears to me there cannot be less than 20,000 men within a day's march
+of the Tuileries, and there may be half as many more.[8]
+
+[Footnote 8: The sudden disbandment of the guards and other troops in
+1830 greatly diminished the actual force of the country.]
+
+Since our arrival there have been several great military displays, and I
+have made it a point to be present at them all. The first was a _petite
+guerre_,[9] on the plains of Issy, or within a mile of the walls of the
+town. There may have been 15,000 men assembled for the occasion,
+including troops of all arms.
+
+[Footnote 9: Sham-fight.]
+
+One of the first things that struck me at Paris was the careless
+militia-like manner in which the French troops marched about the
+streets. The disorder, irregularity, careless and indifferent style of
+moving, were all exactly such as I have heard laughed at a thousand
+times in our own great body of national defenders. But this is only one
+of many similar instances, in which I have discovered that what has been
+deemed a peculiarity in ourselves, arising from the institutions
+perhaps, is a very general quality belonging rather to man than to any
+particular set of men. Our notions, you will excuse the freedom of the
+remark, are apt to be a little provincial, and every one knows that
+fashion, opinions and tastes only become the more exaggerated the
+farther we remove from the centre of light. In this way, we come to
+think of things in an exaggerated sense, until, like the boy who is
+disappointed at finding a king a man, we form notions of life that are
+anything but natural and true.
+
+I was still so new to all this, however, that I confess I went to the
+plain of Issy expecting to see a new style of manoeuvring, or, at least,
+one very different from that which I had so often witnessed at home, nor
+can I say that in this instance there was so much disappointment. The
+plan of the day did not embrace two parties, but was merely an attack on
+an imaginary position, against which the assailants were regularly and
+scientifically brought up, the victory being a matter of convention. The
+movements were very beautiful, and were made with astonishing spirit and
+accuracy. All idea of disorder or the want of regularity was lost here,
+for entire battalions advanced to the charges without the slightest
+apparent deviation from perfectly mathematical lines.
+
+When we reached the acclivity that overlooked the field, a new line was
+forming directly beneath us, it being supposed that the advance of the
+enemy had already been driven in upon his main body, and the great
+attack was just on the point of commencing.
+
+A long line of infantry of the French guards formed the centre of the
+assailants. Several batteries of artillery were at hand, and divers
+strong columns of horse and foot were held in reserve. A regiment of
+lancers was on the nearest flank, and another of cuirassiers was
+stationed at the opposite. All the men of the royal family were in the
+field, surrounded by a brilliant staff. A gun was fired near them, by
+way of signal, I suppose, when two brigades of artillery galloped
+through the intervals of the line, unlimbered, and went to work as if
+they were in downright earnest. The cannonade continued a short time,
+when the infantry advanced in line, and delivered its fire by companies,
+or battalions, I could not discern which, in the smoke. This lasted some
+ten minutes, when I observed a strong column of troops, dressed in
+scarlet, moving up with great steadiness and regularity from the rear.
+These were the Swiss Guards, and there might have been fifteen hundred
+or two thousand of them. The column divided into two, as it approached
+the rear of the line, which broke into column in turn, and for a minute
+there was a confused crowd of red and blue coats, in the smoke, that
+quite set my nautical instinct at defiance. The cuirassiers chose this
+moment to make a rapid and menacing movement in advance, but without
+opening their column, and some of the artillery reappeared and commenced
+firing at the unoccupied intervals. This lasted a very little while for
+the Swiss deployed into line like clock-work, and then made a quick
+charge, with beautiful precision. Halting, they threw in a heavy fire,
+by battalions; the French guard rallied and formed upon their flanks;
+the whole reserve came up; the cuirassiers and lancers charged, by
+turning the position assailed, and for ten or fifteen minutes there was
+a succession of quick evolutions, which like the _finale_ of a grand
+piece of music, appeared confused even while it was the most scientific,
+and then there was a sudden pause. The position, whose centre was a
+copse, had been carried, and we soon saw the guards formed on the ground
+that was supposed to have been held by the enemy. The artillery still
+fired occasionally, as on a retreating foe, and the lancers and
+cuirassiers were charging and manoeuvring, half a mile farther in
+advance, as if following up their advantage.
+
+Altogether, this was much the prettiest field exercise I ever witnessed.
+There was a unity of plan, a perfection of evolution, and a division of
+_matériel_ about it, that rendered it to my eyes as nearly perfect as
+might be. The troops were the best of France, and the management of the
+whole had been confided to some one accustomed to the field. It
+contained all the poetry, without any of the horrors of a battle. It
+could not possess the heart-stirring interest of a real conflict, and
+yet it was not without great excitement.
+
+Some time after the _petite guerre_ of Issy, the capital celebrated the
+fête of the Trocadero. The Trocadero, you may remember, was the fortress
+of Cadix, carried by assault, under the order of the Dauphin, in the war
+of the late Spanish revolution. This government, which has destroyed all
+the statues of the Emperor, proscribed his family, and obliterated every
+visible mark of his reign in their power, has had the unaccountable
+folly of endeavouring to supplant the military glory acquired under
+Napoleon by that of Louis Antoine, Dauphin of France! A necessary
+consequence of the attempt, is a concentration of all the military
+souvenirs of the day in this affair of the Trocadero. Bold as all this
+will appear to one who has not the advantage of taking a near view of
+what is going on here, it has even been exceeded, through the abject
+spirit of subserviency in those who have the care of public instruction,
+by an attempt to exclude even the name of the Bonaparte from French
+history. My girls have shown me an abridgment of the history of France,
+that has been officially prepared for the ordinary schools, in which
+there is no sort of allusion to him. The wags here say, that a work has
+been especially prepared for the heir presumptive, however, in which the
+Emperor is a little better treated; being spoken of as "a certain
+Marquis de Bonaparte, who commanded the armies of the king."
+
+The mimic attack on the Trocadero, like its great original, was at
+night. The troops assembled in the Champs de Mars, and the assault was
+made, across the beautiful bridge of Jena, on a sharp acclivity near
+Passy, which was the imaginary fortress. The result was a pretty good
+effect of night-firing, some smoke, not a little noise, with a very
+pretty movement of masses. I could make nothing of it, of much interest,
+for the obscurity prevented the eyes from helping the imagination.
+
+Not long since, the king held a great review of regular troops, and of
+the entire body of the National Guards of Paris and its environs. This
+review also took place in the Champs de Mars, and it was said that
+nearly a hundred thousand men were under arms for the occasion. I think
+there might have been quite seventy thousand. These mere reviews have
+little interest, the evolutions being limited to marching by regiments
+on and off the ground. In doing the latter, the troops defile before the
+king. Previously to this, the royal cortege passed along the several
+lines, receiving the usual honours.
+
+On this occasion the Dauphine and the Duchesse de Berri followed the
+king in open carriages, accompanied by the little Duc de Bordeaux and
+his sister. I happened to be at an angle of the field as the royal
+party, surrounded by a showy group of marshals and generals, passed, and
+when there seemed to be a little confusion. As a matter of course, the
+cry of "Vive le roi!" had passed along with the procession; for, popular
+or not, it is always easy for a sovereign to procure this sign of
+affection, or for others to procure it for him. You will readily
+understand that _employés_ of the government are especially directed to
+betray the proper enthusiasm on such occasions. There was however, a cry
+at this corner of the area that did not seem so unequivocally loyal,
+and, on inquiry, I was told that some of the National Guards had cried
+"A bas les ministres!" The affair passed off without much notice,
+however; and I believe it was generally forgotten by the population
+within an hour. The desire to get rid of M. de Villèle and his set was
+so general in Paris, that most people considered the interruption quite
+as a matter of course.
+
+The next day the capital was electrified by a royal ordinance,
+disbanding all the National Guards of Paris! A more infatuated, or, if
+it were intended to punish the disaffected, a more unjust decree, could
+not easily have been issued. It was telling the great majority of the
+very class which forms the true force of every government that their
+rulers could not confide in them. As confidence, by awakening pride,
+begets a spirit in favour of those who depend on it, so does obvious
+distrust engender disaffection. But the certainty that Louis XVI. lost
+his throne and his life for the want of decision, has created one of
+those sweeping opinions here of the virtue of energy, that constantly
+leads the rulers into false measures. An act that might have restrained
+the France of 1792, would be certain to throw the France of 1827 into
+open revolt. The present generation of Frenchmen, in a political sense,
+have little in common with even the French of 1814, and measures must be
+suited to the times in which we live. As well might one think of using
+the birch on the man, that had been found profitable with the boy, as to
+suppose these people can be treated like their ancestors.
+
+As might have been expected, a deep, and what is likely to prove a
+lasting discontent, has been the consequence of the blunder. It is
+pretended that the shopkeepers of Paris are glad to be rid of the
+trouble of occasionally mounting guard, and that the affair will be
+forgotten in a short time. All this may be true enough, in part, and it
+would also be true in the whole, were there not a press to keep
+disaffection alive, and to inflame the feelings of those who have been
+treated so cavalierly; for he knows little of human nature who does not
+understand that, while bodies of men commit flagrant wrongs without the
+responsibility being kept in view by their individual members, an
+affront to the whole is pretty certain to be received as an affront to
+each of those who make an integral part.
+
+The immediate demonstrations of dissatisfaction have not amounted to
+much, though the law and medical students paraded the streets, and
+shouted beneath the windows of the ministers the very cry that gave rise
+to the disbandment of the guards. But, if no other consequence has
+followed this exercise of arbitrary power, I, at least, have learned how
+to disperse a crowd. As you may have occasion some days, in your
+military capacity, to perform this unpleasant duty, it may be worth
+while to give you a hint concerning the _modus operandi_.
+
+Happening to pass through the Place Vendôme, I found the foot of the
+celebrated column which stands directly in the centre of the square
+surrounded by several hundred students. They were clustered together
+like bees, close to the iron railing which encloses the base of the
+pillar, or around an area of some fifty or sixty feet square. From time
+to time they raised a shout, evidently directed against the ministers,
+of whom one resided at no great distance from the column. As the hotel
+of the État-Major of Paris is in this square, and there is always a post
+at it, it soon became apparent there was no intention quietly to submit
+to this insult. I was attracted by a demonstration on the part of the
+_corps de garde_, and, taking a station at no greet distance from the
+students, I awaited the issue.
+
+The guard, some thirty foot soldiers, came swiftly out of the court of
+the hotel, and drew up in a line before its gate. This happened as I
+reached their own side of the square, which I had just crossed.
+Presently, a party of fifteen or twenty _gendarmes à cheval_ came up,
+and wheeled into line. The students raised another shout, as it might
+be, in defiance. The infantry shouldered arms, and, filing off singly,
+headed by an officer, they marched in what we call Indian file, towards
+the crowd. All this was done in the most quiet manner possible, but
+promptly, and with an air of great decision and determination. On
+reaching the crowd, they penetrated it, in the same order, quite up to
+the railing. Nothing was said, nor was anything done; for it would have
+been going farther than the students were prepared to proceed, had they
+attempted to seize and disarm the soldiers. This appeared to be
+understood, and, instead of wasting the moments and exasperating his
+enemies by a parley, the officer, as has just been said, went directly
+through them until he reached the railing. Once there, he began to
+encircle it, followed in the same order by his men. The first turn
+loosened the crowd, necessarily, and then I observed that the muskets,
+which hitherto had been kept at a "carry," were inclined a little
+outwards. Two turns enabled the men to throw their pieces to a charge,
+and, by this time, they had opened their order so far as to occupy the
+four sides of the area. Facing outwards, they advanced very slowly, but
+giving time for the crowd to recede. This manoeuvre rendered the throng
+less and less dense, when, watching their time, the mounted gendarmes
+rode into it in a body, and, making a circuit, on a trot, without the
+line of infantry, they got the mass so loosened and scattered, that,
+unarmed as the students were, had they been disposed to resist, they
+would now have been completely at the mercy of the troops. Every step
+that was gained of course weakened the crowd, and, in ten minutes, the
+square was empty; some being driven out of it in one direction, and some
+in another, without a blow being struck, or even an angry word used. The
+force of the old saying, "that the king's name is a tower of strength,"
+or, the law being on the side of the troops, probably was of some avail;
+but a mob of fiery young Frenchmen is not too apt to look at the law
+with reverence.
+
+I stood near the hotels, but still in the square, when a gendarme,
+sweeping his sabre as one would use a stick in driving sheep, came near
+me. He told me to go away. I smiled, and said I was a stranger, who was
+looking at the scene purely from curiosity. "I see you are, sir," he
+answered, "but you had better fall back into the Rue de la Paix." We
+exchanged friendly nods, and I did as he told me, without further
+hesitation. In truth, there remained no more to be seen.
+
+Certainly, nothing could have been done in better temper, more
+effectually, nor more steadily, than this dispersion of the students.
+There is no want of spirit in these young men, you must know, but the
+reverse is rather the case. The troops were under fifty in number, and
+the mob was between six hundred and a thousand, resolute, active, sturdy
+young fellows, who had plenty of fight in them, but who wanted the unity
+of purpose that a single leader can give to soldiers. I thought this
+little campaign of the column of the Place Vendôme quite as good, in its
+way, as the _petite guerre_ of the plains of Issy.
+
+I do not know whether you have fallen into the same error as myself in
+relation to the comparative merits of the cavalry of this part of the
+world, though I think it is one common to most Americans. From the
+excellence of their horses, as well as from that general deference for
+the character and prowess of the nation which exists at home, I had been
+led to believe that the superior qualities of the British cavalry were
+admitted in Europe. This is anything but true; military men, so far as I
+can learn, giving the palm to the Austrian artillery, the British
+infantry, and the French cavalry. The Russians are said to be generally
+good for the purposes of defence, and in the same degree deficient for
+those of attack. Some shrewd observers, however, think the Prussian
+army, once more, the best in Europe.
+
+The French cavalry is usually mounted on small, clumsy, but sturdy
+beasts, that do not show a particle of blood. Their movement is awkward,
+and their powers, for a short effort, certainly are very much inferior
+to those of either England or America. Their superiority must consist in
+their powers of endurance; for the blooded animal soon falls off, on
+scanty fare and bad grooming. I have heard the moral qualities of the
+men given as a reason why the French cavalry should be superior to that
+of England. The system of conscription secures to an army the best
+materials, while that of enlistment necessarily includes the worst. In
+this fact is to be found the real moral superiority of the French and
+Prussian armies. Here, service, even in the ranks, is deemed honourable;
+whereas with us, or in England, it would be certain degradation to a man
+of the smallest pretension to enlist as a soldier, except in moments
+that made stronger appeals than usual to patriotism. In short, it is
+_primâ facie_ evidence of a degraded condition for a man to carry a
+musket in a regular battalion. Not so here. I have frequently seen
+common soldiers copying in the gallery of the Louvre, or otherwise
+engaged in examining works of science or of taste; not ignorantly, and
+with vulgar wonder, but like men who had been regularly instructed. I
+have been told that a work on artillery practice lately appeared in
+France, which excited so much surprise by its cleverness, that an
+inquiry was set on foot for its author. He was found seated in a
+cabriolet in the streets, his vocation being that of a driver. What
+renders his knowledge more surprising is the fact, that the man was
+never a soldier at all; but, having a great deal of leisure, while
+waiting for his fares, he had turned his attention to this subject, and
+had obtained all he knew by means of books. Nothing is more common than
+to see the drivers of cabriolets and fiacres reading in their seats; and
+I have even seen market-women, under their umbrellas, _à la Robinson_,
+with books in their hands. You are not, however, to be misled by these
+facts, which merely show the influence of the peculiar literature of the
+country, so attractive and amusing; for a very great majority of the
+French can neither read nor write. It is only in the north that such
+things are seen at all, except among the soldiers, and a large
+proportion of even the French army are entirely without schooling.
+
+To return to the cavalry, I have heard the superiority of the French
+ascribed also to their dexterity in the use of the sabre, or, as it is
+termed here, _l'arme blanche_. After all, this is rather a poetical
+conclusion; for charges of cavalry rarely result in regular hand-to-hand
+conflicts. Like the bayonet, the sabre is seldom used except on an
+unresisting enemy. Still, the consciousness of such a manual superiority
+might induce a squadron less expert to wheel away, or to break, without
+waiting for orders.
+
+I have made the acquaintance, here, of an old English general, who has
+passed all his life in the dragoons, and who commanded brigades of
+cavalry in Spain and at Waterloo. As he is a sensible old man, of great
+frankness and simplicity of character, perfect good breeding and good
+nature, and moreover, so far as I can discover, absolutely without
+prejudice against America, he has quite won my heart, and I have availed
+myself of his kindness to see a good deal of him. We walk together
+frequently, and chat of all things in heaven and earth, just as they
+come uppermost. The other day I asked him to explain the details of a
+charge of his own particular arm to me, of which I confessed a proper
+ignorance. "This is soon done," said the old gentleman, taking my arm
+with a sort of sly humour, as if he were about to relate something
+facetious: "against foot, a charge is a menace; if they break, we profit
+by it; if they stand, we get out of the scrape as well as we can. When
+foot are in disorder, cavalry does the most, and it is always active in
+securing a victory, usually taking most of the prisoners. But as against
+cavalry, there is much misconception. When two regiments assault each
+other, it is in compact line--" "How," I interrupted him, "do not you
+open, so as to leave room to swing a sabre?" "Not at all. The theory is
+knee to knee; but this is easier said than done, in actual service. I
+will suppose an unsuccessful charge. We start, knee to knee, on a trot.
+This loosens the ranks, and, as we increase the speed, they become still
+looser. We are under the fire of artillery, or, perhaps, of infantry,
+all the time, and the enemy won't run. At this moment, a clever officer
+will command a retreat to be sounded. If he should not, some officer is
+opportunely killed, or some leading man loses command of his horse,
+which is wounded and wheels, the squadron follows, and we get away as
+well as we can. The enemy follows, and if he catches us, we are cut up.
+Other charges do occur; but this is the common history of cavalry
+against cavalry, and, in unsuccessful attacks of cavalry, against
+infantry too. A knowledge of the use of the sword is necessary; for did
+your enemy believe you ignorant of it, he would not fly; but the weapon
+itself is rarely used on such occasions. Very few men are slain in their
+ranks by the bayonet or the sabre."
+
+I was once told, though not directly by an officer, that the English
+dragoon neglected his horse in the field, selling the provender for
+liquor, and that, as a consequence, the corps became inefficient;
+whereas the French dragoon, being usually a sober man, was less exposed
+to this temptation. This may, or may not, be true; but drunkenness is
+now quite common in the French army, though I think much less so in the
+cavalry than in the foot. The former are generally selected with some
+care, and the common regiments of the line, as a matter of course,
+receive the refuse of the conscription.
+
+This conscription is after all, extremely oppressive and unjust, though
+it has the appearance of an equal tax. Napoleon had made it so
+unpopular, by the inordinate nature of his demands for men, that Louis
+XVIII. caused an article to be inserted in the charter, by which it was
+to be altogether abolished. But a law being necessary to carry out this
+constitutional provision, the clause remains a perfect dead letter, it
+being no uncommon thing for the law to be stronger than the constitution
+even in America, and quite a common thing here. I will give you an
+instance of the injustice of the system. An old servant of mine has been
+drafted for the cavalry. I paid this man seven hundred francs a year,
+gave him coffee, butter, and wine, with his food, and he fell heir to a
+good portion of my old clothes. The other day he came to see me, and I
+inquired into his present situation. His arms and clothes were found
+him. He got neither coffee, wine, nor butter; and his other food, as a
+matter of course, was much inferior to that he had been accustomed to
+receive with me. His pay, after deducting the necessary demands on it in
+the shape of regular contributions, amounts to about two sous a day,
+instead of the two francs he got in my service.
+
+Now, necessity, in such matters, is clearly the primary law. If a
+country cannot exist without a large standing army, and the men are not
+to be had by voluntary enlistments, a draft is probably the wisest and
+best regulation for its security. But, taking this principle as the
+basis of the national defence, a just and a paternal government would
+occupy itself in equalizing the effects of the burden, as far as
+circumstances would in any manner admit. The most obvious and efficient
+means would be by raising the rate of pay to the level, at least, of a
+scale that should admit of substitutes being obtained at reasonable
+rates. This is done with us, where a soldier receives a full ration, all
+his clothes, and sixty dollars a year.[10] It is true, that this would
+make an army very costly, and, to bear the charge, it might be necessary
+to curtail some of the useless magnificence and prodigality of the other
+branches of the government; and herein is just the point of difference
+between the expenditures of America and those of France. It must be
+remembered, too, that a really free government, by enlisting the popular
+feeling in its behalf through its justice, escapes all the charges that
+are incident to the necessity of maintaining power by force, wanting
+soldiers for its enemies without, and not for its enemies within. We
+have no need of a large standing army, on account of our geographical
+position, it is true; but had we the government of France, we should not
+find that our geographical position exempted us from the charge.
+
+[Footnote 10: He now receives seventy-two.]
+
+You have heard a great deal of the celebrated soldiers who surrounded
+Napoleon, and whose names have become almost as familiar to us as his
+own. I do not find that the French consider the marshals men of singular
+talents. Most of them reached their high stations on account of their
+cleverness in some particular branch of their duties, and by their
+strong devotion, in the earlier parts of their career, to their master.
+Maréchal Soult has a reputation for skill in managing the civil detail
+of service. As a soldier, he is also distinguished for manoeuvring in
+the face of his enemy, and under fire. Some such excitement appears
+necessary to arouse his dormant talents. Suchet is said to have had
+capacity; but, I think, to Massena, and to the present King of Sweden,
+the French usually yield the palm in this respect. Davoust was a man of
+terrible military energy, and suited to certain circumstances, but
+scarcely a man of talents. It was to him Napoleon said, "remember, you
+have but a single friend in France--myself; take care you do not lose
+him." Lannes seems to have stood better than most of them as a soldier,
+and Macdonald as a man. But, on the whole, I think it quite apparent
+there was scarcely one among them all calculated to have carried out a
+very high fortune for himself, without the aid of the directing genius
+of his master. Many of them had ambition enough for anything; but it was
+an ambition stimulated by example, rather than by a consciousness of
+superiority.
+
+In nothing have I been more disappointed than in the appearance of these
+men. There is more or less of character about the exterior and
+physiognomy of them all, it is true; but scarcely one has what we are
+accustomed to think the carriage of a soldier. It may be known to you
+that Moreau had very little of this, and really one is apt to fancy he
+can see the civic origin in nearly all of them. While the common French
+soldiers have a good deal of military coquetry, the higher officers
+appear to be nearly destitute of it. Maréchal Molitor is a fine man;
+Maréchal Marmont, neat, compact, and soldierly-looking; Maréchal
+Mortier, a grenadier without grace; Maréchal Oudinot, much the same; and
+so on to the end of the chapter. Lamarque is a little swarthy man, with
+good features and a keen eye; but he is military in neither carriage nor
+mien.
+
+Crossing the Pont Royal, shortly after my arrival, in company with a
+friend, the latter pointed out to me a stranger, on the opposite
+side-walk, and desired me to guess who and what he might be. The subject
+of my examination was a compact, solidly-built man, with a plodding
+rustic air, and who walked a little lame. After looking at him a minute,
+I guessed he was some substantial grazier, who had come to Paris on
+business connected with the supplies of the town. My friend laughed, and
+told me it was Marshal Soult. To my inexperienced eye, he had not a bit
+of the exterior of a soldier, and was as unlike the engravings we see of
+the French heroes as possible. But here, art is art; and like the man
+who was accused of betraying another into a profitless speculation by
+drawing streams on his map, when the land was without any, and who
+defended himself by declaring no one ever saw a _map_ without streams,
+the French artists appear to think every one should be represented in
+his ideal character, let him be as _bourgeois_ as he may in truth. I
+have seen Marshal Soult in company, and his face has much character. The
+head is good, and the eye searching, the whole physiognomy possessing
+those latent fires that one would be apt to think would require the
+noise and excitement of a battle to awaken. La Fayette looks more like
+an old soldier than any of them. Gérard, however, is both a handsome man
+and of a military mien.
+
+Now and then we see a _vieux moustache_ in the guards; but, on the
+whole, I have been much surprised at finding how completely the army of
+this country is composed of young soldiers. The campaigns of Russia, of
+1813, 1814, and of 1815, left few besides conscripts beneath the eagles
+of Napoleon. My old servant Charles tells me that the guardhouse is
+obliged to listen to tales of the campaign of Spain, and of the
+Trocadero!
+
+The army of France is understood to be very generally disaffected. The
+restoration has introduced into it, in the capacity of general officers,
+many who followed the fortunes of the Bourbons into exile, and some, I
+believe, who actually fought against this country in the ranks of her
+enemies. This may be, in some measure, necessary, but it is singularly
+unfortunate.
+
+I have been told, on good authority, that, since the restoration of
+1815, several occasions have occurred, when the court thought itself
+menaced with a revolution. On all these occasions the army, as a matter
+of course, has been looked to with hope or with distrust. Investigation
+is said to have always discovered so bad a spirit, that little reliance
+is placed on its support.
+
+The traditions of the service are all against the Bourbons. It is true,
+that very few of the men who fought at Marengo and Austerlitz still
+remain; but then the recollection of their deeds forms the great delight
+of most Frenchmen. There is but one power that can counteract this
+feeling, and it is the power of money. By throwing itself into the arms
+of the industrious classes, the court might possibly obtain an ally,
+sufficiently strong to quell the martial spirit of the nation; but, so
+far from pursuing such a policy, it has all the commercial and
+manufacturing interests marshalled against it, because it wishes to
+return to the _bon vieux tems_ of the old system.
+
+After all, I much question if any government in France will have the army
+cordially with it, that does not find it better employment than
+mock-fights on the plain of Issy, and night attacks on the mimic
+Trocadero.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER IX.
+
+Royal Dinner.--Magnificence and Comfort.--Salle de Diane.--Prince de
+Condé.--Duke of Orleans.--The Dinner-table.--The Dauphin.--Sires de
+Coucy.--The Dauphine.--Ancient Usages--M. de Talleyrand.--Charles X.
+--Panoramic Procession.--Droll Effect.--The Dinner.--M. de Talleyrand's
+Office.--The Duchesse de Berri.--The Catastrophe.--An Aristocratic
+Quarrel.
+
+
+To MRS. SINGLETON W. BEALL, GREEN BAY.
+
+We have lately witnessed a ceremony that may have some interest for one
+who, like yourself, dwells in the retirement of a remote frontier post.
+It is etiquette for the kings of France to dine in public twice in the
+year, viz. the 1st of January, and the day that is set apart for the
+fête of the king. Having some idle curiosity to be present on one of
+these occasions, I wrote the usual note to the lord in, waiting, or, as
+he is called here, "le premier gentilhomme de la chambre du roi, de
+service," and we got the customary answer, enclosing us tickets of
+admission. There are two sorts of permissions granted on these
+occasions: by one you are allowed to remain in the room during the
+dinner; and by the other, you are obliged to walk slowly through the
+salle, in at one side and out at the other, without, however, being
+suffered to pause even for a moment. Ours were of the former
+description.
+
+The King of France having the laudable custom of being punctual, and as
+every one dines in Paris at six, that best of all hours for a town life,
+we were obliged to order our own dinner an hour earlier than common, for
+looking at others eating on an empty stomach is, of all amusements, the
+least satisfactory. Having taken this wise precaution, we drove to the
+chateau at half after five, it not being seemly to enter the room after
+the king, and, as we discovered, for females impossible.
+
+Magnificence and comfort seldom have much in common. We were struck with
+this truth on entering the palace of the king of France. The room into
+which we were first admitted was filled with tall, lounging foot
+soldiers, richly attired, but who lolled about the place with their caps
+on, and with a barrack-like air that seemed to us singularly in contrast
+with the prompt and respectful civility with which one is received in
+the ante-chamber of a private hotel. It is true that we had nothing to
+do with the soldiers and lackeys who thronged the place; but if their
+presence was intended to impress visitors with the importance of their
+master, I think a more private entrance would have been most likely to
+produce that effect; for I confess, that it appeared to me has a mark of
+poverty, that troops being necessary to the state and security of the
+monarch, he was obliged to keep them in the vestibule by which his
+guests entered. But this is royal state. Formerly, the executioner was
+present; and in the semi-barbarous courts of the East, such is the fact
+even now. The soldiers were a party of the Hundred Swiss; men chosen for
+their great stature, and remarkable for the perfection of their musket.
+Two of them were posted as sentinels at the foot of the great staircase
+by which we ascended, and we passed several more on the landings.
+
+We were soon in the Salle des Gardes, or the room which the _gardes du
+corps_ on service occupied. Two of these _quasi_ soldiers were also
+acting as sentinels here, while others lounged about the room. Their
+apartment communicated with the Salle de Diane, the hall or gallery
+prepared for the entertainment. I had no other means but the eye of
+judging of the dimensions of this room; but its length considerably
+exceeds a hundred feet, and its breadth is probably forty, or more. It
+is of the proper height, and the ceiling is painted in imitation of
+those of the celebrated Farnese Palace at Rome.
+
+We found this noble room divided, by a low railing, into three
+compartments. The centre, an area of some thirty feet by forty,
+contained the table, and was otherwise prepared for the reception of the
+court. On one side of it were raised benches for the ladies, who were
+allowed to be seated; and, on the other, a vacant space for the
+gentlemen, who stood. All these, you will understand, were considered
+merely as spectators, not being supposed to be in the presence of the
+king. The mere spectators were dressed as usual, or in common evening
+dress, and not all the women even in that; while those within the
+railings, being deemed to be in the royal presence, were in high court
+dresses. Thus I stood for an hour within five-and-twenty feet of the
+king, and part of the time much nearer, while, by a fiction of
+etiquette, I was not understood to be there at all. I was a good while
+within ten feet of the Duchesse de Berri, while, by convention, I was
+nowhere. There was abundance of room in our area, and every facility of
+moving about, many coming and going, as they saw fit. Behind us, but at
+a little distance, were other rows of raised seats, filled with the best
+instrumental musicians of Paris. Along the wall, facing the table, was a
+narrow raised platform, wide enough to allow of two or three to walk
+abreast, separated from the rest of the room by a railing, and extending
+from a door at one end of the gallery, to a door at the other. This was
+the place designed for the passage of the public during the dinner; no
+one, however, being admitted, even here, without a ticket.
+
+A gentleman of the court led your aunt to the seats reserved for the
+female spectators, which were also without the railing, and I took my
+post among the men. Although the court of the Tuileries was, when we
+entered the palace, filled with a throng of those who were waiting to
+pass through the Gallery of Diana, to my surprise, the number of persons
+who were to remain in the room was very small. I account for the
+circumstance, by supposing, that it is not etiquette for any who have
+been presented to attend, unless they are among the court; and, as some
+reserve was necessary in issuing these tickets, the number was
+necessarily limited. I do not think there were fifty men on our side,
+which might have held several hundred; and the seats of the ladies were
+not half filled. Boxes were fitted up in the enormous windows, which
+closed and curtained, a family of fine children occupying that nearest
+to me. Some one said they were the princes of the house of Orleans; for
+none of the members of the royal family have seats at the _grands
+couverts_, as these dinners are called, unless they belong to the
+reigning branch. There is but one Bourbon prince more remote from the
+crown[11] than the Duc d'Orléans, and this is the Prince de Condé, or, as
+he is more familiarly termed here, the Duc de Bourbon, the father of the
+unfortunate Duc d'Enghien. So broad are the distinctions made between
+the sovereign and the other members of his family in these governments,
+that it was the duty of the Prince de Condé to appear to-day behind the
+king's chair, as the highest dignitary of his household; though it was
+understood that he was excused, on account of his age and infirmities.
+These broad distinctions, you will readily imagine, however, are only
+maintained on solemn and great state occasions; for, in their ordinary
+intercourse, kings nowadays dispense with most of the ancient
+formalities of their rank. It would have been curious, however, to see
+one descendant of St. Louis standing behind the chair of another, as a
+servitor; and more especially, to see the Prince de Condé standing
+behind the chair of Charles X.; for, when Comte d'Artois and Duc de
+Bourbon, some fifty years since, they actually fought a duel on account
+of some slight neglect of the wife of the latter by the former.
+
+[Footnote 11: 1827]
+
+The crown of France, as you know, passes only in the male line. The Duke
+of Orleans is descended from Louis XIII., and the Prince de Condé from
+Louis IX. In the male line, the Duke of Orleans is only the fourth
+cousin, once removed, of the king, and the Prince de Condé the eighth or
+ninth. The latter would be even much more remotely related to the crown,
+but for the accession of his own branch of the family in the person of
+Henry IV. who was a near cousin of his ancestor. Thus you perceive,
+while royalty is always held in reverence--for any member of the family
+may possibly become the king--still there are broad distinctions made
+between the near and the more distant branches of the line. The Duke of
+Orleans fills that equivocal position in the family, which is rather
+common in the history of this species of government. He is a liberal,
+and is regarded with distrust by the reigning branch, and with hope by
+that portion of the people who think seriously of the actual state of
+the country. A saying of M. de Talleyrand, however, is circulated at his
+expense, which, if true, would go to show that this wary prince is not
+disposed to risk his immense fortune in a crusade for liberty. "Ce n'est
+pas assez d'être quelqu'un--il faut être quelque chose," are the words
+attributed to the witty and wily politician; but, usually, men have
+neither half the wit nor half the cunning that popular accounts ascribe
+to them, when it becomes the fashion to record their acts and sayings. I
+believe the Duke of Orleans holds no situation about the court, although
+the king has given him the title of _Royal_ Highness, his birth
+entitling him to be styled no more than _Serene_ Highness. This act of
+grace is much spoken of by the Bourbonists, who consider it a favour
+that for ever secures the loyalty and gratitude of the Duke. The
+Duchess, being the daughter of a king, had this rank from her birth.
+
+The orchestra was playing when we entered the Gallery of Diana, and
+throughout the whole evening it gave us, from time to time, such music
+as can only be found in a few of the great capitals of Europe.
+
+The covers were laid, and every preparation was made within the railing
+for the reception of the _convives_. The table was in the shape of a
+young moon, with the horns towards the spectators, or from the wall. It
+was of some length, and as there were but four covers, the guests were
+obliged to be seated several feet from each other. In the centre was an
+armchair, covered with crimson velvet, and ornamented with a crown; this
+was for the king. A chair without arms, on his right, was intended for
+the Dauphin; another on his left, for the Dauphine; and the fourth,
+which was still further on the right of the Dauphin, was intended for
+Madame, as she is called, or the Duchess of Berri. These are the old and
+favourite appellations of the monarchy, and, absurd as some of them are,
+they excite reverence and respect from their antiquity. Your Wolverines,
+and Suckers, and Buckeyes, and Hooziers would look amazed to hear an
+executive styled the White Fish of Michigan, or the Sturgeon of
+Wisconsin; and yet there is nothing more absurd in it, in the abstract,
+than the titles that were formerly given in Europe, some of which have
+descended to our times. The name of the country, as well as the title of
+the sovereign, in the case of Dauphiné, was derived from the same
+source. Thus, in homely English, the Dolphin of Dolphinstown, renders
+"le Dauphin de Dauphiné" perfectly well. The last independent Dauphin,
+in bequeathing his states to the King of France of the day, (the
+unfortunate John, the prisoner of the Black Prince,) made a condition
+that the heir apparent of the kingdom should always be known by his own
+title, and consequently, ever since, the appellation has been continued.
+You will understand, that none but an _heir-apparent_ is called the
+Dauphin, and not an _heir-presumptive_. Thus, should the present Dauphin
+and the Duc de Bordeaux die, the Duke of Orleans, according to a treaty
+of the time of Louis XIV., though not according to the ancient laws of
+the monarchy, would become _heir-presumptive_; but he could never be the
+Dauphin, since, should the king marry again, and have another son, his
+rights would be superseded. None but the _heir-apparent_, or the
+_inevitable_ heir, bears this title. There were formerly _Bears_ in
+Belgium, who were of the rank of Counts. These appellations were derived
+from the arms, the Dauphin now bearing dolphins with the lilies of
+France. The Boar of Ardennes got his _sobriquet_ from bearing the head
+of a wild boar in his arms. There were formerly many titles in France
+that are now extinct, such as Captal, Vidame, and Castellan, all of
+which were general, I believe, and referred to official duties. There
+was, however, formerly, a singular proof of how even simplicity can
+exalt a man, when the fashion runs into the opposite extremes. In the
+thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, there existed in France powerful
+noblemen, the owners and lords of the castle and lands of Coucy or
+Couci, who were content to bear the appellation of Sire, a word from
+which our own "Sir" is derived, and which means, like Sir, the simplest
+term of courtesy that could be used. These Sires de Coucy were so
+powerful as to make royal alliances; they waged war with their
+sovereign, and maintained a state nearly royal. Their pride lay in their
+antiquity, independence, and power; and they showed their contempt for
+titles by their device, which is said to have been derived from the
+answer of one of the family to the sovereign, who, struck with the
+splendour of his appearance and the number of his attendants, had
+demanded, "What king has come to my court?" This motto, which is still
+to be seen on the ancient monuments of the family, reads:--
+
+      "Je ne suis roi, ne prince, ne duc, ne comte aussi;
+                Je suis le Sire de Coucy."[12]
+
+[Footnote 12: "I am neither king, nor prince, nor duke, nor even a count;
+I am M. de Coucy."]
+
+This greatly beats Coke of Holkham, of whom it is said that George IV.,
+who had been a liberal in his youth, and the friend of the great Norfolk
+commoner, vexed by his bringing up so many liberal addresses,
+threatened--"If Coke comes to me with any more of his Whig petitions,
+_I'll Knight him_."
+
+I have often thought that this simplicity of the Sires de Coucy
+furnishes an excellent example for our own ministers and citizens when
+abroad. Instead of attempting to imitate the gorgeous attire of their
+colleagues, whose magnificence, for the want of stars and similar
+conventional decorations, they can never equal, they should go to court
+as they go to the President's House, in the simple attire of American
+gentlemen. If any prince should inquire,--"Who is this that approaches
+me, clad so simply that I may mistake him for a butler, or a groom of
+the chambers?" let him answer, "Je ne suis roi, ne prince, ne duc, ne
+comte aussi--I am the minister of the United States of Ameri_key_," and
+leave the rest to the millions at home. My life for it, the question
+would not be asked twice. Indeed, no man who is truly fit to represent
+the republic would ever have any concern about the matter. But all this
+time the dinner of the King of France is getting cold.
+
+We might have been in the gallery fifteen minutes, when there was a stir
+at a door on the side where the females were seated, and a _huissier_
+cried out--"Madame la Dauphine!" and, sure enough, the Dauphine
+appeared, followed by two _dames d'honneur_. She walked quite through
+the gallery, across the area reserved for the court, and passed out at
+the little gate in the railing which communicated with our side of the
+room, leaving the place by the same door at which we had entered. She
+was in high court dress, with diamonds and lappets, and was proceeding
+from her own apartments, in the other wing of the palace, to those of
+the king. As she went within six feet of me, I observed her hard and yet
+saddened countenance with interest; for she has the reputation of
+dwelling on her early fortunes, and of constantly anticipating evil. Of
+course she was saluted by all in passing, but she hardly raised her eyes
+from the floor; though, favoured by my position, I got a slight,
+melancholy smile, in return for my own bow.
+
+The Dauphine had scarcely disappeared, when her Royal Highness, Madame,
+was announced, and the Duchess of Berri went through in a similar
+manner. Her air was altogether less constrained, and she had smiles and
+inclinations for all she passed. She is a slight, delicate, little
+woman, with large blue eyes, a fair complexion, and light hair. She
+struck me as being less a Bourbon than an Austrian, and, though wanting
+in _embonpoint_, she would be quite pretty but for a cast in one of her
+eyes.
+
+A minute or two later, we had Monseigneur le Dauphin, who passed through
+the gallery in the same manner as his wife and sister-in-law. He had
+been reviewing some troops, and was in the uniform of a colonel of the
+guards; booted to the knees, and carrying a military hat in his hand. He
+is not of commanding presence, though I think he has the countenance of
+an amiable man, and his face is decidedly Bourbon. We were indebted to
+the same lantern like construction of the palace, for this preliminary
+glimpse at so many of the actors in the coming scene.
+
+After the passage of the Dauphin, a few courtiers and superior officers
+of the household began to appear within the railed space. Among them
+were five or six duchesses. Women of this rank have the privilege of
+being seated in the presence of the king on state occasions, and
+_tabourets_ were provided for them accordingly. A _tabouret_ is a
+stuffed stool, nearly of the form of the ancient cerulean chair, without
+its back, for a back would make it a chair at once, and, by the
+etiquette of courts, these are reserved for the blood-royal,
+ambassadors, etc. As none but duchesses could be seated at the _grand
+couvert_, you may be certain none below that rank appeared. There might
+have been a dozen present. They were all in high court dresses. One, of
+great personal charms and quite young, was seated near me, and my
+neighbour, an old _abbé_, carried away by enthusiasm, suddenly exclaimed
+to me--"Quelle belle fortune, monsieur, d'être jeune, jolie, et
+duchesse!" I dare say the lady had the same opinion of the matter.
+
+Baron Louis, not the financier, but the king's physician, arrived. It
+was his duty to stand behind the king's chair, like Sancho's tormentor,
+and see that he did not over-eat himself. The ancient usages were very
+tender of the royal person. If he travelled, he had a spare litter, or a
+spare coach, to receive him, in the event of accident,--a practice that
+is continued to this day; if he ate, there was one to taste his food,
+lest he might be poisoned; and when he lay down to sleep, armed
+sentinels watched at the door of his chamber. Most of these usages are
+still continued, in some form or other, and the ceremonies which are
+observed at these public dinners are mere memorials of the olden time.
+
+I was told the following anecdote by Mad. de ----, who was intimate with
+Louis XVIII. One day, in taking an airing, the king was thirsty, and
+sent a footman to a cottage for water. The peasants appeared with some
+grapes, which they offered, as the homage of their condition. The king
+took them and ate them, notwithstanding the remonstrances of his
+attendants. This little incident was spoken of at court, where all the
+monarch does and says becomes matter of interest, and the next time Mad.
+de ---- was admitted, she joined her remonstrances to those of the other
+courtiers. "We no longer live in an age when kings need dread
+assassins," said Louis, smiling. A month passed, and Mad. de ---- was
+again admitted. She was received with a melancholy shake of the head,
+and with tears. The Duc de Berri had been killed in the interval!
+
+A few gentlemen, who did not strictly belong to the court, appeared
+among the duchesses, but, at the most, there were but six or eight. One
+of them, however, was the gayest looking personage I ever saw in the
+station of a gentleman, being nothing but lace and embroidery, even to
+the seams of his coat; a sort of genteel harlequin. The _abbé_, who
+seemed to understand himself, said he was a Spanish grandee.
+
+I was near the little gate, when an old man, in a strictly court dress,
+but plain and matter-of-fact in air, made an application for admittance.
+In giving way for him to pass, my attention was drawn to his appearance.
+The long white hair that hung down his face, the _cordon bleu_, the lame
+foot, the imperturbable countenance, and the _unearthly aspect_, made me
+suspect the truth. On inquiring, I was right. It was M. de Talleyrand!
+He came as grand chamberlain, to officiate at the dinner of his master.
+
+Everything, in a court, goes by clock-work. Your little great may be out
+of time, and affect a want of punctuality, but a rigid attention to
+appointments is indispensable to those who are really in high
+situations. A failure in this respect would produce the same impression
+on the affairs of men, that a delay in the rising of the sun would
+produce on the day. The appearance of the different personages named,
+all so near each other, was the certain sign that one greater than all
+could not be far behind. They were the dawn of the royal presence.
+Accordingly, the door which communicated with the apartments of the
+king, and the only one within the railed space, opened with the
+announcement of "Le service du Roi," when a procession of footmen of the
+palace appeared, bearing the dishes of the first course. All the
+vessels, whether already on the table, or those in their hands, were of
+gold, richly wrought, or, at least, silver gilt, I had no means of
+knowing which; most probably they were of the former metal. The dishes
+were taken from the footmen by pages, of honour in scarlet dresses, and
+by them placed in order on the table. The first course was no sooner
+ready, than we heard the welcome announcement of "Le Roi." The family
+immediately made their appearance, at the same door by which the service
+had entered. They were followed by a proper number of lords and ladies
+in waiting. Every one arose, as a matter of course, even to the "jeunes,
+jolies, et duchesses;" and the music, as became it, gave us a royal
+crash. The huissier, in announcing the king, spoke in a modest voice,
+and less loud, I observed, than in announcing the Dauphin and the
+ladies. It was, however, a different person; and it is probable one was
+a common huissier, and the other a gentleman acting in that character.
+
+Charles X. is tall, without being of a too heavy frame, flexible of
+movement, and decidedly graceful. By remembering that he is king, and
+the lineal chief of the ancient and powerful family of the Bourbons, by
+deferring properly to history and the illusions of the past, and by
+feeling _tant soit peu_ more respect for those of the present day than
+is strictly philosophical, or perhaps wise, it is certainly possible to
+fancy that he has a good deal of that peculiar port and majesty that the
+poetry of feeling is so apt to impute to sovereigns. I know not whether
+it is the fault of a cynical temperament, or of republican prejudices,
+but I can see no more, about him than the easy grace of an old
+gentleman, accustomed all his life to be a principal personage among the
+principal personages of the earth. This you may think was quite
+sufficient,--but it aid not altogether satisfy the _exigence_ of my
+unpoetical ideas. His countenance betrayed, a species of vacant
+_bonhommie_, rather than of thought or dignity of mind; and while he
+possessed, in a singular degree, the mere physical machinery of his
+rank, he was wanting in the majesty of character and expression, without
+which no man can act well the representation of royalty. Even a little
+more severity of aspect would have better suited the part, and rendered
+_le grand couvert encore plus grand_.
+
+The king seated himself, after receiving the salutations of the
+courtiers within the railing, taking no notice however, of those who, by
+a fiction of etiquette, were not supposed to be in his presence. The
+rest of the family occupied their respective places in the order I have
+named, and the eating and drinking began, from the score. The different
+courses were taken off and served by footmen and pages in the manner
+already described, which, after all, by substituting servants out of
+livery for pages, is very much the way great dinners are served, in
+great houses, all over Europe.
+
+As soon as the king was seated, the north door of the gallery, or that
+on the side opposite to the place where I had taken post, was opened,
+and the public was admitted, passing slowly through the room without
+stopping. A droller _mélange_ could not be imagined than presented
+itself in the panoramic procession; and long before the _grand couvert_
+was over, I thought it much the most amusing part of the scene. Very
+respectable persons, gentlemen certainly, and I believe in a few
+instances ladies, came in this way, to catch a glimpse of the spectacle.
+I saw several men that I knew, and the women with them could have been
+no other than their friends. To these must be added, _cochers de
+fiacres_ in their glazed hats, _bonnes_ in their high Norman caps,
+peasants, soldiers in their shakos, _épiciers_ and _garçons_ without
+number. The constant passage, for it lasted without intermission for an
+hour and a half, of so many queer faces, reminded me strongly of one of
+those mechanical panoramas, that bring towns, streets, and armies,
+before the spectator. One of the droll effects of this scene was
+produced by the faces, all of which turned, like sunflowers, towards the
+light of royalty, as the bodies moved steadily on. Thus, on entering,
+the eyes were a little inclined to the right; as they got nearer to the
+meridian, they became gradually bent more aside; when opposite the
+table, every face, was _full_; and, in retiring, all were bent backwards
+over their owners' shoulders, constantly offering a dense crowd of
+faces, looking towards a common centre, while the bodies were coming on,
+or moving slowly off the stage. This, you will see, resembled in some
+measure the revolutions of the moon around our orb, matter and a king
+possessing the same beneficent attraction. I make no doubt, these good
+people thought we presented a curious spectacle; but I am persuaded they
+presented one that was infinitely more so.
+
+I had seen in America, in divers places, an Englishman, a colonel in the
+army. We had never been introduced, but had sat opposite to each other
+at _tables d'hôtes_, jostled each other in the President's House, met in
+steam-boats, in the streets, and in many other places, until it was
+evident our faces were perfectly familiar to both parties; and yet we
+never nodded, spoke, or gave any other sign of recognition, than by
+certain knowing expressions of the eyes. In Europe, the colonel
+reappeared. We met in London, in Paris, in the public walks, in the
+sight-seeing places of resort, until we evidently began to think
+ourselves a couple of Monsieur Tonsons. To-night, as I was standing near
+the public platform, whose face should appear in the halo of
+countenances but that of my colonel! The poor fellow had a wooden leg,
+and he was obliged to stump on in his orbit as well as he could, while I
+kept my eye on him, determined to catch a look of recognition if
+possible. When he got so far forward as to bring me in his line of
+sight, our eyes met, and he smiled involuntarily. Then he took a
+deliberate survey of my comfortable position, and he disappeared in the
+horizon, with some such expression on his features as must have belonged
+to Commodore Trunnion, when he called out to Hatchway, while the hunter
+was leaping over the lieutenant, "Oh! d--n you; you are well anchored!"
+
+I do not think the dinner, in a culinary point of view, was anything
+extraordinary. The king ate and drank but little, for, unlike his two
+brothers and predecessors, he is said to be abstemious. The Daupin
+played a better knife and fork; but on the whole, the execution was by
+no means great for Frenchmen. The guests sat so far apart, and the music
+made so much noise, that conversation was nearly out of the question;
+though the King and the Dauphin exchanged a few words in the course of
+the evening. Each of the gentlemen, also, spoke once or twice to his
+female neighbour, and that was pretty much the amount of the discourse.
+The whole party appeared greatly relieved by having something to do
+during the desert, in admiring the service, which was of the beautiful
+Sèvres china. They all took up the plates, and examined them
+attentively; and really I was glad they had so rational an amusement to
+relieve their _ennui_.
+
+Once, early in the entertainment, M. de Talleyrand approached the king,
+and showed him the bill of fare! It was an odd spectacle to see this old
+_diplomate_ descending to the pantomime of royalty, and acting the part
+of a _maître d'hôtel_. Had the duty fallen on Cambacères, one would
+understand it, and fancy that it might be well done. The king smiled on
+him graciously, and, I presume, gave him leave to retire; for soon after
+this act of loyal servitude, the prince disappeared. As for M. Louis, he
+treated Charles better than his brother treated Sancho; for I did not
+observe the slightest interference, on his part, during the whole
+entertainment; though one of those near me said he had tasted a dish or
+two by way of ceremony,--an act of precaution that I did not myself
+observe. I asked my neighbour, the _abbé_, what he thought of M. de
+Talleyrand. After looking up in my face distrustfully, he
+whispered:--"Mais, monsieur, c'est un chat qui tombe toujours sur ses
+pieds;" a remark that was literally true tonight, for, the old man was
+kept on his feet longer than could have been agreeable to the owner of
+two such gouty legs.
+
+The Duchesse de Berri, who sat quite near the place where I stood, was
+busy a good deal of the time _à lorgner_ the public through her
+eye-glass. This she did with very little diffidence of manner, and quite
+as coolly as an English duchess would have stared at a late intimate
+whom she was disposed to cut. It certainly was neither a graceful, nor a
+feminine, nor a princely occupation. The Dauphine played the Bourbon
+better; though, when she turned her saddened, not to say _cruel_ eyes,
+on the public, it was with an expression that almost amounted to
+reproach. I did not see her smile once during the whole time she was at
+table; and yet _I_ thought there were many things to smile at.
+
+At length the finger-bowls appeared, and I was not sorry to see them.
+Contrary to what is commonly practised in very great houses, the pages
+placed them on the table, just as Henri puts them before us democrats
+every day. I ought to have said, that the service was made altogether in
+front, or at the unoccupied side of the table, nothing but the bill of
+fare, in the hands of M. de Talleyrand, appearing in the rear. As soon as
+this part of the dinner was over, the king arose, and the whole party
+withdrew by the door on the further side of the galery. In passing the
+_gradins_ of the ladies, he stopped to says a few kind words to an old
+woman who was seated there, muffled in a cloak, and the light of royalty
+vanished.
+
+The catastrophe is to come. The instant the king's back was turned, the
+gallery became a scene of confusion. The musicians ceased playing, and
+began to chatter; the pages dashed about to remove the service, and
+everybody was in motion. Observing that your ---- was standing undecided
+what to do, I walked into the railed area, brushed past the gorgeous
+state table, and gave her my arm. She laughed, and said it had all been
+very magnificent and amusing, but that some one had stolen her shawl! A
+few years before, I had purchased for her a merino shawl, of singular
+fineness, simplicity, and beauty. It was now old, and she had worn it on
+this occasion, because she distrusted the dirt of a palace; and laying
+it carelessly by her side, in the course of the evening she had found in
+its place a very common thing of the same colour. The thief was deceived
+by its appearance your ---- being dressed for an evening party, and had
+probably mistaken it for a cashmere. So much for the company one meets
+at court! Too much importance, however, must not be attached to this
+little _contretems_, as people of condition are apt to procure tickets
+for such places, and to give them to their _femmes de chambre_.
+Probably, half the women present, the "jeunes et jolies" excepted, were
+of this class. But mentioning this affair to the old Princesse de ----,
+she edified me by an account of the manner in which Madame la Comtesse
+de ---- had actually appropriated to the service of her own pretty person
+the _cachemire_ of Madame la Baronne de ----, in the royal presence; and
+how there was a famous quarrel, _à l'outrance_, about it; so I suspend
+my opinions as to the quality of the thief.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER X.
+
+Road to Versailles.--Origin of Versailles.--The present Chateau.--The
+two Trianons.--La Petite Suisse.--Royal Pastime.--Gardens of Versailles.
+--The State Apartments.--Marie Antoinette's Chamber.--Death of Louis XV.
+--Oeil de Boeuf.--The Theatre and Chapel.--A
+Quarry.--Caverns.--Compiègne.--Chateau de Pierre-font.--Influence of
+Monarchy.--Orangery at Versailles.
+
+
+To R. COOPER, ESQ., COOPERSTOWN, NEW YORK.
+
+We have been to Versailles, and although I have no intention to give a
+laboured description of a place about which men have written and talked
+these two centuries, it is impossible to pass over a spot of so much
+celebrity in total silence.
+
+The road to Versailles lies between the park of St. Cloud and the
+village and manufactories of Sèvres. A little above the latter is a
+small palace, called Meudon, which, from its great elevation, commands a
+fine view of Paris. The palace of St. Cloud, of course, stands in the
+park; Versailles lies six or eight miles farther west; Compiègne is
+about fifty miles from Paris in one direction; Fontainebleau some thirty
+in another, and Rambouillet rather more remotely, in a third. All these
+palaces, except Versailles, are kept up, and from time to time are
+visited by the court. Versailles was stripped of its furniture in the
+revolution; and even Napoleon, at a time when the French empire extended
+from Hamburgh to Rome, shrunk from the enormous charge of putting it in
+a habitable state. It is computed that the establishment at Versailles,
+first and last, in matters of construction merely, cost the French
+monarchy two hundred millions of dollars! This is almost an incredible
+sum, when we remember the low price of wages in France; but, on the
+other hand, when we consider the vastness of the place, how many natural
+difficulties were overcome, and the multitude of works from the hands of
+artists of the first order it contained, it scarcely seems sufficient.
+
+Versailles originated as a hunting-seat, in the time of Louis XIII. In
+that age, most of the upland near Paris, in this direction, lay in
+forest, royal chases; and, as hunting was truly a princely sport,
+numberless temporary residences of this nature existed in the
+neighbourhood of the capital. There are still many remains of this
+barbarous magnificence, as in the wood of Vincennes, the forest of St.
+Germain, Compiègne, Fontainebleau, and divers others; but great inroads
+have been made in their limits by the progress of civilization and the
+wants of society. So lately as the reign of Louis XV. they hunted quite
+near the town; and we are actually, at this moment, dwelling in a
+country house, at St. Ouen, in which, tradition hatch it, he was wont to
+take his refreshments.
+
+The original building at Versailles was a small chateau, of a very ugly
+formation, and it was built of bricks. I believe it was enlarged, but
+not entirely constructed, by Louis XIII. A portion of this building is
+still visible, having been embraced in the subsequent structures; and,
+judging from its architecture, I should think it must be nearly as
+ancient as the time of Francis I. Around this modest nucleus was
+constructed, by a succession of monarchs, but chiefly by Louis XIV. the
+most regal residence of Europe, in magnificence and extent, if not in
+taste.
+
+The present chateau, besides containing numberless wings and courts, has
+vast _casernes_ for the quarters of the household troops, stables for
+many hundred horses, and is surrounded by a great many separate hotels,
+for the accommodation of the courtiers. It offers a front on the garden,
+in a single continuous line, that is broken only by a projection in the
+centre of more than a third of a mile in length. This is the only
+complete part of the edifice that possesses uniformity; the rest of it
+being huge piles grouped around irregular courts, or thrown forward in
+wings, that correspond to the huge body like those of the ostrich. There
+is on the front next the town, however, some attempt at simplicity and
+intelligibility of plan; for there is a vast open court lined by
+buildings, which have been commenced in the Grecian style. Napoleon, I
+believe, did something here, from which there is reason to suppose that
+he sometimes thought of inhabiting the palace. Indeed, so long as France
+has a king, it is impossible that such a truly royal abode can ever be
+wholly deserted. At present, it is the fashion to grant lodgings in it
+to dependants and favourites. Nothing that I have seen gives me so just
+and so imposing an idea of the old French monarchy as a visit to
+Versailles. Apart from the vastness and splendour of the palace, here is
+a town that actually contained, in former times, a hundred thousand
+souls, that entirely owed its existence to the presence of the court.
+Other monarchs lived in large towns; but here was a monarch whose
+presence created one. Figure to yourself the style of the prince, when a
+place more populous than Baltimore, and infinitely richer in externals,
+existed merely as an appendage to his abode!
+
+The celebrated garden contains two or three hundred acres of land,
+besides the ground that is included in the gardens of the two Trianons.
+These Trianons are small palaces erected in the gardens, as if the
+occupants of the chateau, having reached the acmé of magnificence and
+splendour in the principal residence, were seeking refuge against the
+effect of satiety in these humbler abodes. They appear small and
+insignificant after the palace; but the Great Trianon is a considerable
+house, and contains a fine suite of apartments, among which are some
+very good rooms. There are few English abodes of royalty that equal even
+this of Le Grand Trianon. The Petit Trianon was the residence of Madame
+de Maintenon; it afterwards was presented to the unfortunate Marie
+Antoinette, who, in part converted its grounds into an English garden,
+in addition to setting aside a portion into what is called La Petite
+Suisse.
+
+We went through this exceedingly pretty house and its gardens with
+melancholy interest. The first is merely a pavilion in the Italian
+taste, though it is about half as large as the President's House, at
+Washington. I should think the Great Trianon has quite twice the room of
+our own Executive residence; and, as you can well imagine, from what has
+already been said, the Capitol itself would be but a speck among the
+endless edifices of the chateau. The projection in the centre of the
+latter is considerably larger than the capitol, and it materially
+exceeds that building in cubic contents. Now this projection is but a
+small part indeed of the long line of façade, it actually appearing too
+short for the ranges of wings.
+
+Marie Antoinette was much censured for the amusements in which she
+indulged in the grounds of the Little Trianon, and vulgar rumour
+exaggerating their nature, no small portion of her personal unpopularity
+is attributable to this cause. The family of Louis XVI. appears to have
+suffered for the misdeeds of its predecessors, for it not being very
+easy to fancy anything much worse than the immoralities of Louis XV. the
+public were greatly disposed "to visit the sins of the fathers on the
+children."
+
+La Petite Suisse is merely a romantic portion of the garden, in which
+has been built what is called the Swiss Hamlet It contains the miniature
+abodes of the Curé, the Farmer, the Dairywoman, the Garde-de-Chasse, and
+the Seigneur, besides the mill. There is not much that is Swiss,
+however, about the place, with the exception of some resemblance in the
+exterior of the buildings. Here, it is said, the royal family used
+occasionally to meet, and pass an afternoon in a silly representation of
+rural life, that must have proved to be a prodigious caricature. The
+King (at least, so the guide affirmed), performed the part of the
+Seigneur, and occupied the proper abode; the Queen was the Dairy woman,
+and we were shown the marble tables that held her porcelain milk-pans;
+the present King, as became his notorious propensity to field-sports,
+was the Garde-de-Chasse, the late King was the Miller, and, _mirabile
+dictu_, the Archbishop of Paris did not disdain to play the part of the
+Curé. There was, probably, a good deal of poetry in this account; though
+it is pretty certain that the Queen did indulge in some of these
+phantasies. There happened to be with me, the day I visited this spot,
+an American from our own mountains, who had come fresh from home, with
+all his provincial opinions and habits strong about him. As the guide
+explained these matters, I translated them literally into English for
+the benefit of my companion, adding, that the fact rendered the Queen
+extremely unpopular with her subjects. "Unpopular!" exclaimed my country
+neighbour; "why so, sir?" "I cannot say; perhaps they thought it was not
+a fit amusement for a queen." My mountaineer stood a minute cogitating
+the affair in his American mind; and then nodding his head, he said:--"I
+understand it now. The people thought that a king and queen, coming from
+yonder palace to amuse themselves in this toy hamlet, in the characters
+of poor people, _were making game of them_!" I do not know whether this
+inference will amuse you as much as it did me at the time.
+
+Of the gardens and the _jets d'eau_, so renowned, I shall say little.
+The former are in the old French style, formal and stiff, with long
+straight _allées_, but magnificent by their proportions and ornaments.
+The statuary and vases that are exposed to the open air, in this garden,
+must have cost an enormous sum. They are chiefly copies from the
+_antique_.
+
+As you stand on the great terrace, before the centre of the palace, the
+view is down the principal avenue, which terminates at the distance of
+two or three miles with a low naked hill, beyond which appears the void
+of the firmament. This conceit singularly helps the idea of vastness,
+though in effect it is certainly inferior to the pastoral prettiness and
+rural thoughts of modern landscape gardening. Probably too much is
+attempted here; for if the mind cannot conceive of illimitable space,
+still less can it be represented by means of material substances.
+
+We examined the interior of the palace with melancholy pleasure. The
+vast and gorgeous apartments were entirely without furniture, though
+many of the pictures still remain. The painted ceilings, and the
+gildings too, contribute to render the rooms less desolate than they
+would otherwise have been. I shall not stop to describe the saloons of
+Peace and War, and all the other celebrated apartments, that are so
+named from the subjects of their paintings, but merely add that the
+state apartments lie _en suite_, in the main body of the building, and
+that the principal room, or the great gallery, as it is termed, is in
+the centre, with the windows looking up the main avenue of the garden.
+This gallery greatly surpasses in richness and size any other room,
+intended for the ordinary purposes of a palace, that I have ever seen.
+Its length exceeds two hundred and thirty feet, its width is about
+thirty-five, and its height is rather more than forty. The walls are a
+complete succession of marbles, mirrors, and gildings. I believe, the
+windows and doors excepted, that literally no part of the sides or ends
+of this room show any other material. Even some of the doors are loaded
+with these decorations. The ceiling is vaulted, and gorgeous with
+allegories and gildings; they are painted by the best artists of France.
+Here Louis XIV. moved among his courtiers, more like a god than a man,
+and here was exhibited that mixture of grace and moral fraud, of
+elegance and meanness, of hope and disappointment, of pleasure and
+mortification, that form the characters and compose the existence of
+courtiers.
+
+I do not know the precise number of magnificent ante-chambers and saloons
+through which we passed to reach this gallery, but there could not have
+been less than eight; one of which, as a specimen of the scale on which
+the palace is built, is near eighty feet long, and sixty wide. Continuing
+our course along the suite, we passed, among others, a council-room that
+looked more like state than business, and then came to the apartments of
+the Queen. There were several drawing-rooms, and ball-rooms, and
+card-rooms, and ante-rooms, and the change from the gorgeousness of the
+state apartments, to the neat, tasteful, chaste, feminine, white and gold
+of this part of the palace was agreeable, for I had got to be tired of
+splendour, and was beginning to feel a disposition to "make game of the
+people," by descending to rusticity.
+
+The bed-room of Marie Antoinette is in the suite. It is a large chamber,
+in the same style of ornament as the rest of her rooms, and the
+dressing-rooms, bath, and other similar conveniences, were in that
+exquisite French taste, which can only be equalled by imitation. The
+chamber of the King looked upon the court, and was connected with that
+of the Queen, by a winding and intricate communication of some length.
+The door that entered the apartments of the latter opened into a
+dressing-room, and both this door and that which communicated with the
+bed-room form a part of the regular wall, being tapestried as such, so
+as not to be immediately seen,--a style of finish that is quite usual in
+French houses. It was owing to this circumstance that Marie Antoinette
+made her escape, undetected, to the King's chamber, the night the palace
+was entered by the fish-women.
+
+We saw the rooms in which Louis XIV. and Louis XV. died. The latter, you
+may remember, fell a victim to the small-pox, and the disgusting body,
+that had so lately been almost worshipped, was deserted, the moment he
+was dead. It was left for hours, without even the usual decent
+observances. It was on the same occasion, we have been told, that his
+grandchildren, including the heir, were assembled in a private
+drawing-room, waiting the result, when they were startled by a hurried
+trampling of feet. It was the courtiers, rushing in a crowd, to pay
+their homage to the new monarch! All these things forced themselves
+painfully on our minds, as we walked through the state rooms. Indeed
+there are few things that can be more usefully studied, or which awaken
+a greater source of profitable recollections, than a palace that has
+been occupied by a great and historical court. Still they are not
+poetical.
+
+The balcony, in which La Fayette appeared with the Queen and her
+children, opens from one of these rooms. It overlooks the inner court;
+or that in which the carriages of none but the privileged entered, for
+all these things were regulated by arbitrary rules. No one, for
+instance, was permitted to ride in the King's coach, unless his nobility
+dated from a certain century (the fourteenth, I believe), and these were
+your _gentilshommes_; for the word implies more than a noble, meaning an
+ancient nobleman.
+
+The writing cabinet, private dining-room, council-room in ordinary,
+library, etc. of the King, came next; the circuit ending in the Salles
+des Gardes, and the apartments usually occupied by the officers and
+troops on service.
+
+There was one room we got into, I scarce know how. It was a long, high
+gallery, plainly finished for a palace, and it seemed to be lighted from
+an interior court, or well; for one was completely caged when in it.
+This was the celebrated Bull's Eye (_oeil de boeuf_), where the
+courtiers danced attendance before they were received. It got its name
+from an oval window over the principal door.
+
+We looked at no more than the state apartments, and those of the King
+and Queen, and yet we must have gone through some thirty or forty rooms,
+of which, the baths and dressing-room of the Queen excepted, the very
+smallest would be deemed a very large room in America. Perhaps no
+private house contains any as large as the smallest of these rooms, with
+the exception of here and there a hall in a country house; and, no room
+at all, with ceilings nearly as high, and as noble, to say nothing of
+the permanent decorations, of which we have no knowledge whatever, if we
+omit the window-glass, and the mantels, in both of which, size apart, we
+often beat even the French palaces.
+
+We next proceeded to the Salle de Spectacle, which is a huge theatre. It
+may not be as large as the French Opera-house at Paris, but its
+dimensions did not appear to me to be much less. It is true, the stage
+was open, and came into the view; but it is a very large house for
+dramatic representations. Now, neither this building nor the chapel,
+seen on the exterior of the palace, though additions that project from
+the regular line of wall, obtrudes itself on the eye, more than a
+verandah attached to a window, on one of our largest houses! In this
+place the celebrated dinner was given to the officers of the guards.
+
+The chapel is rich and beautiful. No catholic church has pews, or, at
+all events they are very unusual, though the municipalities do sometimes
+occupy them in France, and, of course, the area was vacant. We were most
+struck with the paintings on the ceiling, in which the face of Louis
+XIV. was strangely and mystically blended with that of God the Father!
+Pictorial and carved representations of the Saviour and of the Virgin
+abound in all catholic countries; nor do they much offend, unless when
+the crucifixion is represented with bleeding wounds; for, as both are
+known to have appeared in the human form, the mind is not shocked at
+seeing them in the semblance of humanity. But this was the first attempt
+to delineate the Deity we had yet seen; and it caused us all to shudder.
+He is represented in the person of an old man looking from the clouds,
+in the centre of the ceiling, and the King appears among the angels that
+surround him. Flattery could not go much farther, without encroaching on
+omnipotence itself.
+
+In returning from Versailles, to a tithe of the magnificence of which I
+have not alluded, I observed carts coming out of the side of a hill,
+loaded with the whitish stone that composes the building material of
+Paris. We stopped the carriage, and went into the passage, where we
+found extensive excavations. A lane of fifteen or twenty feet was cut
+through the stone, and the material was carted away in heavy square
+blocks. Piers were left, at short intervals, to sustain the
+superincumbent earth; and, in the end, the place gets to be a succession
+of intricate passages, separated by these piers, which resemble so many
+small masses of houses among the streets of a town. The entire region
+around Paris lies on a substratum of this stone, which indurates by
+exposure to the air, and the whole secret of the celebrated catacombs of
+Paris is just the same as that of this quarry, with the difference that
+this opens on a level with the upper world, lying in a hill, while one
+is compelled to descend to get to the level of the others. But enormous
+wheels, scattered about the fields in the vicinity of the town, show
+where shafts descend to new quarries on the plains, which are precisely
+the same as those under Paris. The history of these subterranean
+passages is very simple. The stone beneath has been transferred to the
+surface, as a building material; and the graves of the town, after
+centuries, were emptied into the vaults below. Any apprehensions of the
+caverns falling in, on a great scale, are absurd, as the constant
+recurrence of the piers, which are the living rock, must prevent such a
+calamity; though it is within the limits of possibility that a house or
+two might disappear. Quite lately, it is said, a tree in the garden of
+the Luxembourg fell through, owing to the water working a passage down
+into the quarries, by following its roots. The top of the tree remained
+above ground some distance; and to prevent unnecessary panic, the police
+immediately caused the place to be concealed by a high and close board
+fence. The tree was cut away in the night, the hole was filled up, and
+few knew anything about it. But it is scarcely possible that any serious
+accident should occur, even to a single house, without a previous and
+gradual sinking of its walls giving notice of the event. The palace of
+the Luxembourg, one of the largest and finest edifices of Paris, stands
+quite near the spot where the tree fell through, and yet there is not
+the smallest danger of the structure's disappearing some dark night, the
+piers below always affording sufficient support. _Au reste_, the
+catacombs lie under no other part of Paris than the Quartier St.
+Jacques, not crossing the river, nor reaching even the Faubourg St.
+Germain.
+
+I have taken you so unceremoniously out of the chateau of Versailles to
+put you into the catacombs, that some of the royal residences have not
+received the attention I intended. We have visited Compiègne this
+summer, including it in a little excursion of about a hundred miles,
+that we made in the vicinity of the capital, though it scarcely offered
+sufficient matter of interest to be the subject of an especial letter.
+We found the forest deserving of its name, and some parts of it almost
+as fine as an old American wood of the second class. We rode through it
+five or six miles to see a celebrated ruin, called Pierre-fond, which
+was one of those baronial holds, out of which noble robbers used to
+issue, to plunder on the highway, and commit all sorts of acts of
+genteel violence. The castle and the adjacent territory formed one of
+the most ancient seigneuries of France. The place was often besieged and
+taken. In the time of Henry IV. that monarch, finding the castle had
+fallen into the hands of a set of desperadoes, who were ranked with the
+Leaguers, sent the Duc d'Epernon against the place; but he was wounded,
+and obliged to raise the siege. Marshal Biron was next despatched, with
+all the heavy artillery that could be spared; but he met with little
+better success. This roused Henry, who finally succeeded in getting
+possession of the place. In the reign of his son, Louis XIII, the
+robberies and excesses of those who occupied the castle became so
+intolerable, that the government seized it again, and ordered it to be
+destroyed. Now you will remember that this castle stood in the very
+heart of France, within fifty miles of the capital, and but two leagues
+from a royal residence, and all so lately as the year 1617; and that it
+was found necessary to destroy it, on account of the irregularities of
+its owners. What an opinion one is driven to form of the moral
+civilization of Europe from a fact like this! Feudal grandeur loses
+greatly in a comparison with modern law, and more humble honesty.
+
+It was easier, however, to order the Chateau de Pierre-fond to be
+destroyed, than to effect that desirable object. Little more was
+achieved than to make cuts into the external parts of the towers and
+walls, and to unroof the different buildings; and, although this was
+done two hundred years since, time has made little impression on the
+ruins. We were shown a place where there had been an attempt to break
+into the walls for stones, but which had been abandoned, because it was
+found easier to quarry them from the living rock. The principal towers
+were more than a hundred feet high, and their angles and ornaments
+seemed to be as sharp and solid as ever. This was much the noblest
+French ruin we had seen, and it may be questioned if there are many
+finer, out of Italy, in Europe.
+
+The palace of Compiègne, after that of Versailles, hardly rewarded us
+for the trouble of examining it. Still it is large and in perfect
+repair: but the apartments are common-place, though there are a few that
+are good. A prince, however, is as well lodged, even here, as is usual
+in the north of Europe. The present king is fond of resorting to this
+house, on account of the game of the neighbouring forest. We saw several
+roebucks bounding among the trees, in our drive to Pierre-fond.[13]
+
+[Footnote 13: Pierre-fond, or Pierre-font]
+
+I have dwelt on the palaces and the court so much, because one cannot
+get a correct idea of what France was, and perhaps I ought to say, of
+what France, through the reaction, _will_ be, if this point were
+overlooked. The monarch was all in all in the nation--the centre of
+light, wealth, and honour; letters, the arts, and the sciences revolved
+around him, as the planets revolve around the sun; and if there ever was
+a civilized people whose example it would be fair to quote for or
+against the effects of monarchy, I think it would be the people of
+France. I was surprised at my own ignorance on the subject of the
+magnificence of these kings, of which, indeed, it is not easy for an
+untravelled American to form any just notion; and it has struck me you
+might be glad to hear a little on these points.
+
+After all I have said, I find I have entirely omitted the Orangery at
+Versailles. But then I have said little or nothing of the canals, the
+_jets d'eau_, of the great and little parks, which, united, are fifty
+miles in circumference, and of a hundred other things. Still, as this
+orangery is on a truly royal scale, it deserves a word of notice before
+I close my letter. The trees are housed in winter in long vaulted
+galleries, beneath the great terrace; and there is a sort of sub-court
+in front of them, where they are put into the sun during the pleasant
+season. This place is really an orange grove; and, although every tree
+is in a box, and is nursed like a child, many of them are as large as it
+is usual to find in the orange groves of low latitudes. Several are very
+old, two or three dating from the fifteenth century, and one from the
+early part of it. What notions do you get of the magnificence of the
+place, when you are told, that a palace, subterraneous, it is true, is
+devoted to this single luxury, and that acres are covered with trees in
+boxes?
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XI.
+
+Laws of Intercourse.--Americans in Europe.--Americans and English.
+--Visiting in America.--Etiquette of Visits.--Presentations at Foreign
+Courts.--Royal Receptions.--American Pride.--Pay of the President.
+--American Diplomatist.
+
+
+To JAMES STEVENSON, ESQUIRE, ALBANY.
+
+I intend this letter to be useful rather than entertaining. Living, as we
+Americans do, remote from the rest of the world, and possessing so many
+practices peculiar to ourselves, at the same time that we are altogether
+wanting in usages that are familiar to most other nations, it should not
+be matter of surprise that we commit some mistakes on this side of the
+water, in matters of taste and etiquette. A few words simply expressed,
+and a few explanations plainly made, may serve to remove some errors, and
+perhaps render your own contemplated visit to this part of the world more
+agreeable.
+
+There is no essential difference in the leading rules of ordinary
+intercourse among the polished of all Christian nations. Though some of
+these rules may appear arbitrary, it will be found, on examination, that
+they are usually derived from very rational and sufficient motives. They
+may vary, in immaterial points, but even these variations arise from
+some valid circumstance.
+
+The American towns are growing so rapidly, that they are getting to have
+the population of capitals without enjoying their commonest facilities.
+The exaggerated tone of our largest towns, for instance, forbids the
+exchange of visits by means of servants. It may suit the habits of
+provincial life to laugh at this as an absurdity, but it may be taken
+pretty safely as a rule, that men and women of as much common sense as
+the rest of their fellow-creatures, with the best opportunities of
+cultivating all those tastes that are dependant on society, and with no
+other possible motive than convenience, would not resort to such a
+practice without a suitable inducement. No one who has not lived in a
+large town that _does_ possess these facilities, can justly appreciate
+their great advantages, or properly understand how much a place like New
+York, with its three hundred thousand inhabitants, loses by not adopting
+them. We have conventions for all sorts of things in America, some of
+which do good and others harm, but I cannot imagine anything that would
+contribute more to the comfort of society, than one which should settle
+the laws of intercourse on principles better suited to the real
+condition of the country than those which now exist. It is not unusual
+to read descriptions deriding the forms of Europe, written by travelling
+Americans; but I must think they have been the productions of very young
+travellers, or, at least, of such as have not had the proper means of
+appreciating the usages they ridicule Taking my own experience as a
+guide, I have no hesitation in saying, that I know no people among whom
+the ordinary social intercourse is as uncomfortable, and as little
+likely to stand the test of a rational examination, as our own.
+
+The first rule, all-important for an American to know, is, that the
+latest arrival makes the first visit. England is, in some respects, an
+exception to this practice, but I believe it prevails in all the rest of
+Europe. I do not mean to say that departures are not made from this law,
+in particular instances; but they should always be taken as exceptions,
+and as pointed compliments. This rule has many conveniences, and I think
+it also shows a more delicate attention to sentiment and feeling. While
+the points of intrusion and of disagreeable acquaintances are left just
+where they would be under our own rule, the stranger is made the judge
+of his own wishes. It is, moreover, impossible, in a large town, to know
+of every arrival. Many Americans, who come to Europe with every claim to
+attention, pass through it nearly unnoticed, from a hesitation about
+obtruding themselves on others, under the influence of the opinions in
+which they have been educated. This for a long time was my own case, and
+it was only when a more familiar acquaintance with the practices of this
+part of the world made me acquainted with their advantages that I could
+consent freely to put myself forward.
+
+You are not to understand that any stranger arriving in a place like
+Paris, or London, has a right to leave cards for whom he pleases. It is
+not the custom, except for those who, by birth, or official station, or
+a high reputation, may fairly deem themselves privileged, to assume this
+liberty, and even then, it is always better to take some preliminary
+step to assure one's self that the visit will be acceptable. The law of
+salutes is very much the law of visits, in this part of the world. The
+ship arriving sends an officer to know if his salute will be returned
+gun for gun, and the whole affair, it is true, is conducted in rather a
+categorical manner, but the governing principles are the same in both
+cases, though more management may be required between two gentlemen than
+between two men-of-war.
+
+The Americans in Europe, on account of the country's having abjured all
+the old feudal distinctions that still so generally prevail here, labour
+under certain disadvantages, that require, on the one hand, much tact
+and discretion to overcome, and, on the other, occasionally much
+firmness and decision.
+
+The rule I have adopted in my own case, is to defer to every usage, in
+matters of etiquette, so far as I have understood them, that belongs to
+the country in which I may happen to be. If, as has sometimes happened
+(but not in a solitary instance in France), the claims of a stranger
+have been overlooked, I have satisfied myself by remembering, that, in
+this respect at least, the Americans are the superiors, for that is a
+point in which we seldom fail; and if they are remembered, to accept of
+just as much attention as shall be offered. In cases, in which those
+arbitrary distinctions are set up, that, by the nature of our
+institutions cannot, either in similar or in any parallel cases, exist
+in America, and the party making the pretension is on neutral ground,
+_if the claim be in any manner pressed_, I would say that it became an
+American to resist it promptly; neither to go out of his way to meet it,
+nor to defer to it when it crosses his path. In really good society
+awkward cases of this nature are not very likely to occur; they are,
+however, more likely to occur as between our own people and the English,
+than between those of any other nation; for the latter, in mixed general
+associations, have scarcely yet learned to look upon and treat us as the
+possessors of an independent country. It requires perfect
+self-possession, great tact, and some nerve, for an American, who is
+brought much in contact with the English on the continent of Europe, to
+avoid a querulous and ungentlemanlike disposition to raise objections on
+these points, and at the same time to maintain the position, and command
+the respect, with which he should never consent to dispense. From my own
+little experience, I should say we are better treated, and have less to
+overlook, in our intercourse with the higher than with the intermediate
+classes of the English.
+
+You will have very different accounts of these points, from some of our
+travellers. I only give you the results of my own observation, under the
+necessary limitations of my own opportunities. Still I must be permitted
+to say that too many of our people, in their habitual deference to
+England, mistake offensive condescension for civility. Of the two, I
+will confess I would rather encounter direct arrogance, than the
+assumption of a right to be affable. The first may at least be resisted.
+Of all sorts of superiority, that of a condescending quality is the
+least palatable.
+
+I believe Washington is the only place in America where it is permitted
+to send cards. In every other town, unless accompanied by an invitation,
+and even then the card is supposed to be left, it would be viewed as
+airs. It is even equivocal to leave a card in person, unless denied.
+Nothing can be worse adapted to the wants of American society than this
+rigid conformity to facts. Without porters; with dwellings in which the
+kitchens and servants' halls are placed just as far from the
+street-doors as dimensions of the houses will allow; with large
+straggling towns that cover as much ground as the more populous capitals
+of Europe, and these towns not properly divided into quarters; with a
+society as ambitious of effect, in its way, as any I know; and with
+people more than usually occupied with business and the family
+cares,--one is expected to comply rigidly with the most formal rules of
+village propriety. It is easy to trace these usages to their source,
+provincial habits and rustic manners; but towns with three hundred
+thousand inhabitants ought to be free from both. Such rigid conditions
+cannot well be observed, and a consequence already to be traced is, that
+those forms of society which tend to refine it, and to render it more
+human and graceful, are neglected from sheer necessity. Carelessness in
+the points of association connected with sentiment (and all personal
+civilities and attention have this root) grows upon one like
+carelessness in dress, until an entire community may get to be as
+ungracious in deportment, as it is unattractive in attire.
+
+The etiquette of visits, here, is reduced to a sort of science. A card
+is sent by a servant, and returned by a servant. It is polite to return
+it, next day, though three, I believe, is the lawful limits, and it is
+politer still to return it the day it is received. There is no
+affectation about sending the card, as it is not at all unusual to put
+E.P. _(en personne)_ on it, by way of expressing a greater degree of
+attention, even when the card is sent. When the call is really made in
+person, though the visitor does not ask to be admitted, it is also
+common to request the porter to say that the party was at the gate. All
+these niceties may seem absurd and supererogatory, but depend on it they
+have a direct and powerful agency in refining and polishing intercourse,
+just as begging a man's pardon, when you tread on his toe, has an effect
+to humanize, though the parties know no offence was intended.
+Circumstances once rendered it proper that I should leave a card for a
+Russian _diplomate_, an act that I took care he should know, indirectly,
+I went out of my way to do, as an acknowledgment for the civilities his
+countrymen showed to us Americans. My name was left at the gate of his
+hotel (it was not in Paris), as I was taking a morning ride. On
+returning home, after an absence of an hour, I found his card lying on
+my table. Instead, however, of its containing the usual official titles,
+it was simply Prince --. I was profoundly emerged in the study of this
+new feature in the forms of etiquette, when the friend, who had prepared
+the way for the visit, entered. I asked an explanation, and he told me
+that I had received a higher compliment than could be conveyed by a
+merely official card, this being a proffer of _personal_ attention. "You
+will get an invitation to dinner soon;" and, sure enough, one came
+before he had quitted the house. Now, here was a delicate and flattering
+attention paid, and one that I felt, without trouble to either party;
+one that the occupations of the _diplomate_ would scarcely permit him to
+pay, except in extraordinary cases, under rules more rigid.
+
+There is no obligation on a stranger to make the first visit, certainly;
+but if he do not, he is not to be surprised if no one notices him. It is
+a matter of delicacy to obtrude on the privacy of such a person, it
+being presumed that he wishes to be retired. We have passed some time in
+a village near Paris, which contains six or eight visitable families.
+With one of these I had some acquaintance, and we exchanged civilities;
+but wishing to be undisturbed, I extended my visit no farther, and I
+never saw anything of the rest of my neighbours. They waited for me to
+make the advances.
+
+A person in society, here, who is desirous of relieving himself, for a
+time, from the labour and care of maintaining the necessary intercourse,
+can easily do it, by leaving cards of P.P.O. It might be awkward to
+remain long in a place very publicly after such a step, but I ventured
+on it once, to extricate myself from engagements that interfered with
+more important pursuits, with entire success. I met several
+acquaintances in the street, after the cards were sent, and we even
+talked together, but I got no more visits or invitations. When ready _to
+return to town_, all I had to do was to leave cards again, and things
+went on as if nothing had happened. I parried one or two allusions to my
+absence, and had no further difficulty. The only awkward part of it was,
+that I accepted an invitation to dine _en famille_ with a literary
+friend, and one of the guests, of whom there were but three, happened to
+be a person whose invitation to dinner I had declined on account of
+quitting town! As he was a sensible man, I told him the simple fact, and
+we laughed at the _contretems_, and drank oar wine in peace.
+
+The Americans who come abroad frequently complain of a want of
+hospitality in the public agents. There is a strong disposition in every
+man under institutions like our own, to mistake himself for a part of
+the government, in matters with which he has no proper connexion, while
+too many totally overlook those interests which it is their duty to
+watch. In the first place, the people of the United Slates do not give
+salaries to their ministers of sufficient amount to authorize them to
+expect that any part of the money should be returned in the way of
+personal civilities. Fifty thousand francs a year is the usual sum named
+by the French, as the money necessary to maintain a genteel town
+establishment, with moderate evening entertainments, and an occasional
+dinner. This is three thousand francs more than the salary of the
+minister, out of which he is moreover expected to maintain his regular
+diplomatic intercourse. It is impossible for any one to do much in the
+way of personal civilities, on such an allowance.
+
+There is, moreover, on the part of too many of our people, an aptitude
+to betray a jealous sensitiveness on the subject of being presented at
+foreign courts. I have known some claim it _as a right_ when it is
+yielded to the minister himself as an act of grace. The receptions of a
+sovereign are merely his particular mode of receiving visits. No one
+will pretend that the President of the United States is obliged to give
+levees and dinners, nor is a king any more compelled to receive
+strangers, or even his own subjects, unless it suit his policy and his
+taste. His palace is his house, and he is the master of it, the same as
+any other man is master of his own abode. It is true, the public expects
+something of him, and his allowance is probably regulated by this
+expectation, but the interference does not go so far as to point out his
+company. Some kings pass years without holding a court at all; others
+receive every week. The public obligation to open his door, is no more
+than an obligation of expediency, of which he, and he only, can be the
+judge. This being the rule, not only propriety, but fair dealing
+requires that all who frequent a court should comply with the conditions
+that are understood to be implied in the permission. While there exists
+an exaggerated opinion, on the part of some of our people, on the
+subject of the fastidiousness of princes, as respects their associates,
+there exists among others very confused notions on the other side of the
+question. A monarch usually cares very little about the quarterings and
+the nobility of the person he receives, but he always wishes his court
+to be frequented by people of education, accomplishments, and breeding.
+In Europe these qualities are confined to _castes_, and, beyond a
+question, as a general practice, every king would not only prefer, but,
+were there a necessity for it, he would command that his doors should be
+closed against all others, unless they came in a character different
+from that of courtiers. This object has, in effect, been obtained, by
+establishing a rule, that no one who has not been presented at his own
+court can claim to be presented at any foreign European court; thus
+leaving each sovereign to see that no one of his own subjects shall
+travel with this privilege who would be likely to prove an unpleasant
+guest to any other prince. But we have neither any prince nor any court,
+and the minister is left to decide for himself who is, and who is not,
+proper to be presented.
+
+Let us suppose a case. A master and his servant make a simultaneous
+request to be presented to the King of France. Both are American
+citizens, and if _either_ has any political claim, beyond mere courtesy,
+to have his request attended to, _both_ have. The minister is left to
+decide for himself. He cannot so far abuse the courtesy that permits him
+to present his countrymen at all, as to present the domestic, and of
+course he declines doing it. In this case, perhaps, public opinion would
+sustain him, as, unluckily, the party of the domestics is small in
+America, the duties usually falling to the share of foreigners and
+blacks. But the principle may be carried upwards, until a point is
+attained where a minister might find it difficult to decide between that
+which his own sense of propriety should dictate, and that which others
+might be disposed to claim. All other ministers get rid of their
+responsibility by the acts of their own courts; but the minister of the
+republic is left exposed to the calumny, abuse, and misrepresentation of
+any disappointed individual, should he determine to do what is strictly
+right.
+
+Under these circumstances, it appears to me that there are but two
+courses left for any agent of our government to pursue: either to take
+_official_ rank as his only guide, or to decline presenting any one. It
+is not his duty to act as a master of ceremonies; every court has a
+regular officer for this purpose, and any one who has been presented
+himself, is permitted on proper representations to present others. The
+trifling disadvantage will be amply compensated for, by the great and
+peculiar benefits that arise from our peculiar form of government.
+
+These things will quite likely strike you as of little moment. They are,
+however, of more concern than one living in the simple society of
+America may at first suppose. The etiquette of visiting has of course an
+influence on the entire associations of a traveller, and may not be
+overlooked, while the single fact that one people were practically
+excluded from the European courts, would have the same effect on their
+other enjoyments here, that it has to exclude an individual from the
+most select circles of any particular town. Ordinary life is altogether
+coloured by things that, in themselves, may appear trifling, but which
+can no more be neglected with impunity, than one can neglect the varying
+fashions in dress.
+
+The Americans are not a shoving people, like their cousins the English.
+Their fault in this particular lies in a morbid pride, with a
+stubbornness that is the result of a limited experience, and which is
+too apt to induce them to set up their own provincial notions, as the
+standard, and to throw them backward into the intrenchments, of
+self-esteem. This feeling is peculiarly fostered by the institutions. It
+is easy to err in this manner; and it is precisely the failing of the
+countryman, everywhere, when he first visits town. It is, in fact, the
+fault of ignorance of the world. By referring to what I have just told
+you, it will be seen that these are the very propensities which will be
+the most likely to make one uncomfortable in Europe, where so much of
+the initiative of intercourse is thrown upon the shoulders of the
+stranger.
+
+I cannot conclude this letter without touching on another point, that
+suggests itself at the moment. It is the fashion to decry the
+niggardliness of the American government on the subject of money, as
+compared with those of this hemisphere. Nothing can be more unjust. Our
+working men are paid better than even those of England, with the
+exception of a few who have high dignities to support. I do not see the
+least necessity for giving the President a dollar more than he gets
+to-day, since all he wants is enough to entertain handsomely, and to
+shield him from loss. Under our system, we never can have an _exclusive_
+court, nor is it desirable, for in this age a court is neither a school
+of manners, nor a school of anything else that is estimable. These facts
+are sufficiently proved by England, a country whose mental cultivation
+and manners never stood as high as they do to-day, and yet it has
+virtually been without a court for an entire generation. A court may
+certainly foster taste and elegance; but they may be quite as well
+fostered by other, and less exclusive, means. But while the President
+may receive enough, the heads of departments, at home, and the foreign
+ministers of the country, are not more than half paid, _particularly the
+latter_. The present minister is childless, his establishment and his
+manner of living are both handsome, but not a bit more so than those of
+a thousand others who inhabit this vast capital, and his intercourse
+with his colleagues is not greater than is necessary to the interests of
+his country. Now, I know from his own statement, that his expenses,
+without a family, exceed by one hundred per cent, his salary. With a
+personal income of eighty to a hundred thousand francs a years, he can
+bear this drain on his private fortune, but he is almost the only
+minister we ever had here who could.
+
+The actual position of our diplomatic agents in Europe is little
+understood at home. There are but two or three modes of maintaining the
+rights of a nation, to say nothing of procuring those concessions from
+others which enter into the commercial relations of states, and in some
+degree affect their interests. The best method, certainly, as respects
+the two first, is to manifest a determination to defend them by an
+appeal to force; but so many conflicting interests stand in the way of
+such a policy, that it is exceedingly difficult, wisest and safest in
+the end though it be, to carry it out properly. At any rate, such a
+course has never yet been in the power of the American government,
+whatever it may be able to do hereafter, with its increasing numbers and
+growing wealth. But even strength is not always sufficient to obtain
+voluntary and friendly concessions, for principle must, in some degree,
+be respected by the most potent people, or they will be put to the ban
+of the world. Long diplomatic letters, although they may answer the
+purposes of ministerial _exposés_, and read well enough in the columns
+of a journal, do very little, in fact, as make-weights in negotiations.
+I have been told here, _sub rosâ_, and I believe it that some of our
+laboured efforts, in this way to obtain redress in the protracted
+negotiation for indemnity, have actually lain months in the _bureaux_,
+unread by those who alone have power to settle the question. Some
+_commis_ perhaps may have cursorily related their contents to his
+superior, but the superior himself is usually too much occupied in
+procuring and maintaining ministerial majorities, or in looking after
+the monopolizing concerns of European politics, to wade through folios
+of elaborate argument in manuscript. The public ought to understand,
+that the point presents itself to him in the security of his master's
+capital, and with little or no apprehension of its coming to an appeal
+to arms, very differently from what it occasionally presents itself in
+the pages of a President's message, or in a debate in Congress. He has
+so many demands on his time, that it is even difficult to have a working
+interview with him at all; and when one is obtained, it is not usual to
+do more than to go over the preliminaries. The details are necessarily
+referred to subordinates.
+
+Now, in such a state of things, any one accustomed to the world, can
+readily understand how much may be effected by the kind feelings that
+are engendered by daily, social intercourse. A few words can be
+whispered in the ears of a minister, in the corner of a drawing-room,
+that would never reach him in his bureau. Then _all_ the ministers are
+met in society, while the _diplomate_, properly speaking, can claim
+officially to see but _one_. In short, in saving, out of an overflowing
+treasury, a few thousand dollars a year, we trifle with our own
+interests, frequently embarrass our agents, and in some degree discredit
+the country. I am not one of your _sensitives_ on the subject of parade
+and appearance, nor a member of the embroidery school; still I would
+substitute for the irrational frippery of the European customs, a
+liberal hospitality, and a real elegance, that should speak well for the
+hearts and tastes of the nation. The salary of the minister at Paris, I
+know it, by the experience of a housekeeper, ought to be increased by at
+least one half, and it would tell better for the interests of the
+country were it doubled. Even in this case, however, I do not conceive
+that an American would be justified in mistaking the house of an envoy
+for a national inn; but that the proper light to view his allowances
+would be to consider them as made, first, as an act of justice to the
+functionary himself; next, as a measure of expediency, as connected with
+the important interests of the country. As it is, I am certain that no
+one but a man of fortune can accept a foreign appointment, without
+committing injustice to his heirs; and I believe few do accept them
+without sincerely regretting the step, in after years.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XII.
+
+Sir Walter Scott in Paris.--Conversation with him.--Copyright in
+America.--Miss Scott.--French Compliments.--Sir Walter Scott's Person
+and Manners.--Ignorance as to America.--French Commerce.--French
+Translations.--American Luxury.
+
+
+To JAMES E. DE KAY, ESQUIRE.
+
+We have not only had Mr. Canning in Paris, but Sir Walter Scott has
+suddenly appeared among us. The arrival of the Great Unknown, or,
+indeed, of any little Unknown from England, would be an event to throw
+all the reading clubs at home into a state of high moral and poetical
+excitement. We are true village _lionizers_. As the professors of the
+Catholic religion are notoriously more addicted to yielding faith to
+miraculous interventions, in the remoter dioceses, than in Rome itself;
+as loyalty is always more zealous in a colony than in a court; as
+fashions are more exaggerated in a province than in a capital, and men
+are more prodigious to every one else than their own valets,--so do we
+throw the haloes of a vast ocean around the honoured heads of the
+celebrated men of this eastern hemisphere. This, perhaps, is the natural
+course of things, and is as unavoidable as that the sun shall hold the
+earth within the influence of its attraction, until matters shall be
+reversed by the earth's becoming the larger and more glorious orb of the
+two. Not so in Paris. Here men of every gradation of celebrity, from
+Napoleon down to the Psalmanazar of the day, are so very common, that
+one scarcely turns round in the streets to look at them. Delicate and
+polite attentions, however, fall as much to the share of reputation here
+as in any other country, and perhaps more so as respects literary men,
+though there is so little _wonder-mongering_. It would be quite
+impossible that the presence of Sir Walter Scott should not excite a
+sensation. He was frequently named in the journals, received a good deal
+of private and some public notice, but, on the whole, much less of both,
+I think, than one would have a right to expect for him, in a place like
+Paris. I account for the fact, by the French distrusting the forthcoming
+work on Napoleon, and by a little dissatisfaction which prevails on the
+subject of the tone of "Paul's Letters to his Kinsfolk." This feeling
+may surprise you, as coming from a nation as old and as great as France;
+but, alas! we are all human.
+
+The King spoke to him, in going to his chapel, Sir Walter being in
+waiting for that purpose; but, beyond this, I believe he met with no
+civilities from the court.
+
+As for myself, circumstances that it is needless to recount had brought
+me, to a slight degree, within the notice of Sir Walter Scott, though we
+had never met, nor had I ever seen him, even in public, so as to know
+his person. Still I was not without hopes of being more fortunate now,
+while I felt a delicacy about obtruding myself any further on his time
+and attention. Several days after his arrival went by, however, without
+my good luck bringing me in his way, and I began to give the matter up,
+though the Princesse ---- with whom I had the advantage of being on
+friendly terms, flattered me with an opportunity of seeing the great
+writer at her house, for she had a fixed resolution of making his
+acquaintance before he left Paris, _coûte que coûte_.
+
+It might have been ten days after the arrival of Sir Walter Scott, that
+I had ordered a carriage, one morning, with an intention of driving over
+to the other side of the river, and had got as far as the lower flight
+of steps, on my way to enter it, when, by the tramping of horses in the
+court, I found that another coach was driving in. It was raining, and,
+as my own carriage drove from the door to make way for the newcomer, I
+stopped where I was, until it could return. The carriage-steps rattled,
+and presently a large, heavy-moulded man appeared in the door of the
+hotel. He was grey, and limped a little, walking with a cane. His
+carriage immediately drove round, and was succeeded by mine, again; so I
+descended. We passed each other on the stairs, bowing as a matter of
+course. I had got to the door, and was about to enter the carriage, when
+it flashed on my mind that the visit might be to myself. The two lower
+floors of the hotel were occupied as a girl's boarding-school; the
+reason of our dwelling in it, for our own daughters were in the
+establishment; _au second_, there was nothing but our own _appartement_,
+and above us, again, dwelt a family whose visitors never came in
+carriages. The door of the boarding-school was below, and men seldom
+came to it, at all. Strangers, moreover, sometimes did honour me with
+calls. Under these impressions I paused, to see if the visitor went as
+far as our flight of steps. All this time, I had not the slightest
+suspicion of who he was, though I fancied both the face and form were
+known to me.
+
+The stranger got up the large stone steps slowly, leaning, with one
+hand, on the iron railing, and with the other, on his cane. He was on
+the first landing, as I stopped, and, turning towards the next flight,
+our eyes met. The idea that I might be the person he wanted, seemed then
+to strike him for the first time. "Est-ce Mons. ---- que j'ai l'honneur
+de voir?" he asked, in French, and with but an indifferent accent.
+"Monsieur, je m'appelle ----. Eh bien, donc--je suis Walter Scott."
+
+I ran up to the landing, shook him by the hand, which he stood holding
+out to me cordially, and expressed my sense of the honour he was
+conferring. He told me, in substance, that the Princesse ---- had been
+as good as her word, and having succeeded herself in getting hold of
+him, she had good-naturedly given him my address. By way of cutting
+short all ceremony, he had driven from his hotel to my lodgings. All
+this time he was speaking French, while my answers and remarks were in
+English. Suddenly recollecting himself, he said--"Well, here have I been
+_parlez-vousing_ to you, in a way to surprise you, no doubt; but these
+Frenchmen have got my tongue so set to their lingo, that I have half
+forgotten my own language." As we proceeded up the next flight of steps,
+he accepted my arm, and continued the conversation in English, walking
+with more difficulty than I had expected to see. You will excuse the
+vanity of my repeating the next observation he made, which I do in the
+hope that some of our own exquisites in literature may learn in what
+manner a man of true sentiment and sound feeling regards a trait that
+they have seen fit to stigmatize unbecoming, "I'll tell you what I most
+like," he added, abruptly; "and it is the manner in which you maintain
+the ascendency of your own country on all proper occasions, without
+descending to vulgar abuse of ours. You are obliged to bring the two
+nations in collision, and I respect your liberal hostility." This will
+probably be esteemed treason in our own self-constituted mentors of the
+press, one of whom, I observe, has quite lately had to apologize to his
+readers for exposing some of the sins of the English writers in
+reference to ourselves! But these people are not worth our attention,
+for they have neither the independence which belongs to masculine
+reason, nor manhood even to prize the quality in others. "I am afraid
+the mother has not always treated the daughter well," he continued,
+"feeling a little jealous of her growth, perhaps; for, though we hope
+England has not yet begun to descend on the evil side, we have a
+presentiment that she has got to the top of the ladder."
+
+There were two entrances to our apartments; one, the principal, leading
+by an ante-chamber and _salle à manger_ into the _salon_, and thence
+through other rooms to a terrace; and the other, by a private corridor,
+to the same spot. The door of my cabinet opened on this corridor, and
+though it was dark, crooked, and anything but savoury, as it led by the
+kitchen, I conducted Sir Walter through it, under an impression that he
+walked with pain; an idea of which I could not divest myself, in the
+hurry of the moment. But for this awkwardness on my part, I believe I
+should have been the witness of a singular interview. General Lafayette
+had been with me a few minutes before, and he had gone away by the
+_salon_, in order to speak to Mrs. ----. Having a note to write, I had
+left him there, and I think his carriage could not have quitted the
+court when that of Sir Walter Scott entered. If so, the General must
+have passed out by the ante-chamber about the time we came through the
+corridor.
+
+There would be an impropriety in my relating all that passed in this
+interview; but we talked over a matter of business, and then the
+conversation was more general. You will remember that Sir Walter was
+still the _Unknown_[14] and that he was believed to be in Paris in search
+of facts for the Life of Napoleon. Notwithstanding the former
+circumstance, he spoke of his works with great frankness and simplicity,
+and without the parade of asking any promises of secrecy. In short, as
+he commenced in this style, his authorship was alluded to by us both
+just as if it had never been called in question. He asked me if I had a
+copy of the ---- by me, and on my confessing I did not own a single
+volume of anything I had written, he laughed, and said he believed that
+most authors had the same feeling on the subject: as for himself, he
+cared not if he never saw a Waverley novel again, as long as he lived.
+Curious to know whether a writer as great and as practised as he felt
+the occasional despondency which invariably attends all my own little
+efforts of this nature, I remarked that I found the mere composition of
+a tale a source of pleasure, so much so, that I always invented twice as
+much as was committed to paper in my walks, or in bed, and in my own
+judgment much the best parts of the composition never saw the light; for
+what was written was usually written at set hours, and was a good deal a
+matter of chance, and that going over and over the same subject in
+proofs disgusted me so thoroughly with the book, that I supposed every
+one else would be disposed to view it with the same eyes. To this he
+answered that he was spared much of the labour of proofreading,
+Scotland, he presumed, being better off than America in this respect;
+but still be said he "would as soon see his dinner again after a hearty
+meal as to read one of his own tales when he was fairly rid of it."
+
+[Footnote 14: He did not avow himself for several months afterwards.]
+
+He sat with me nearly an hour, and he manifested, during the time the
+conversation was not tied down to business, a strong propensity to
+humour. Having occasion to mention our common publisher in Paris, he
+quaintly termed him, with a sort of malicious fun, "our Gosling;"[15]
+adding, that he hoped he, at least, "laid golden eggs."
+
+[Footnote 15: His name was Gosselin.]
+
+I hoped that he had found the facilities he desired, in obtaining facts
+for the forthcoming history. He rather hesitated about admitting this.
+"One can hear as much as he pleases, as a gentleman, he is not always
+sure how much of it he can, with propriety, relate in a book;
+besides"--throwing all his latent humour into the expression of his
+small grey eyes--"one may even doubt how much of what he hears is fit
+for history on another account." He paused, and his face assumed an
+exquisite air of confiding simplicity, as he continued, with perfect
+_bonne foi_ and strong Scottish feeling, "I have been to see _my
+countryman_ M'Donald, and I rather think that will be about as much as I
+can do here, now." This was uttered with so much _naïveté_ that I could
+hardly believe it was the same man who, a moment before, had shown so
+much shrewd distrust of oral relations of facts.
+
+I inquired when we might expect the work "Some time in the course of the
+winter," he replied, "though it is likely to prove larger than I at
+first intended. We have got several volumes printed, but I find I must
+add to the matter considerably, in order to dispose of the subject. I
+thought I should get rid of it in seven volumes, which are already
+written, but it will reach, I think, to nine." "If you have two still to
+write, I shall not expect to see the book before spring." "You may: let
+me once get back to Abbotsford, and I'll soon knock off those two
+fellows." To this I had nothing to say, although I thought such a _tour
+de force_ in writing might better suit invention than history.
+
+When he rose to go, I begged him to step into the _salon_, that I might
+have the gratification of introducing my wife to him. To this he very
+good-naturedly assented, and entering the room, after presenting Mrs.
+---- and my nephew W----. he took a seat. He sat some little time, and
+his fit of pleasantry returned, for he illustrated his discourse by one
+or two apt anecdotes, related with a slightly Scottish accent, that he
+seemed to drop and assume at will. Mrs. ---- observed to him that the
+_bergère_ in which he was seated had been twice honoured that morning,
+for General Lafayette had not left it more than half an hour. Sir Walter
+Scott looked surprised at this, and said inquiringly, "I thought he had
+gone to America, to pass the rest of his days." On my explaining the
+true state of the case, he merely observed, "He is a great man;" and yet
+I thought the remark was made coldly, or in complaisance to us.
+
+When Sir Walter left us, it was settled that I was to breakfast with him
+the following day but one. I was punctual, of course, and found him in a
+new silk _douillette_ that he had just purchased, trying "as hard as he
+could," as he pleasantly observed, to make a Frenchman of himself--an
+undertaking as little likely to be successful, I should think, in the
+case of his Scottish exterior, and Scottish interior too, as any
+experiment well could be. There were two or three visitors, besides Miss
+Ann Scott, his daughter, who was his companion in the journey. He was
+just answering an invitation from the Princesse ----, to an evening
+party, as I entered. "Here," said he, "you are a friend of the lady, and
+_parlez-vous_ so much better than I; can you tell me whether this is for
+_Jeudi_, or _Lundi_, or _Mardi_, or whether it means no day at all?" I
+told him the day of the week intended. "You get notes occasionally from
+the lady, or you could not read her scrawl so readily?" "She is very
+kind to us, and we often have occasion to read her writing." "Well, it
+is worth a very good dinner to get through a page of it." "I take my
+revenge in kind, and I fancy she has the worst of it." "I don't know,
+after all that she will get much the better of me with this _plume
+d'auberge._" He was quite right, for, although Sir Walter writes a
+smooth even hand, and one that appears rather well than otherwise on a
+page, it is one of the most difficult to decipher I have ever met with;
+the i's, u's, m's, n's, a's, e's, t's, etc., etc., for want of dots,
+crossings, and being fully rounded, looking all alike, and rendering the
+reading slow and difficult, without great familiarity with his mode of
+handling the pen: at least, I have found it so.
+
+He had sealed the note, and was about writing the direction, when he
+seemed at a loss. "How do you address this lady--as Her Highness?" I
+was much surprised at this question from him, for it denoted a want of
+familiarity with the world, that one would not have expected in a man
+who had been so very much and so long courted by the great. But, after
+all, his life has been provincial, though, as his daughter remarked in
+the course of the morning, they had no occasion to quit Scotland to see
+the world, all the world coming to see Scotland.
+
+The next morning he was with me again, for near an hour and we completed
+our little affair. After this we had a conversation on the law of
+copyrights in the two countries, which as we possess a common language,
+is a subject of great national interest. I understood him to say that he
+had a double right in England to his works; one under a statute, and the
+other growing out of common law. Any one publishing a book, let it be
+written by whom it might, in England, duly complying with the law, can
+secure the right, whereas none but a _citizen_ can do the same in
+America. I regret to say that I misled him on the subject of our
+copyright law, which, after all, is not so much more illiberal than that
+of England as I had thought it.
+
+I told Sir Walter Scott, that, in order to secure a copyright in
+America, it was necessary the book should never have been published
+_anywhere else_. This was said under the popular notion of the matter;
+or that which is entertained among the booksellers. Reflection and
+examination have since convinced me of my error: the publication alluded
+to in the law can only mean publication in America; for, as the object
+of doing certain acts previously to publication is merely to forewarn
+the _American_ public that the right is reserved, there can be no motive
+for having reference to any other publication. It is, moreover, in
+conformity with the spirit of all laws to limit the meaning of their
+phrases by their proper jurisdiction. Let us suppose a case. An American
+writes a book, he sends a copy to England, where it is published in
+March complying with the terms of our own copyright law, as to the
+entries and notices, the same work is published here in April. Now will
+it be pretended that his right is lost, always providing that his own is
+the first _American_ publication? I do not see how it can be so by
+either the letter or the spirit of the law. The intention is to
+encourage the citizen to write, and to give him a just property in the
+fruits of his labour; and the precautionary provisions of the law are
+merely to prevent others from being injured for want of proper
+information. It is of no moment to either of these objects that the
+author of a work has already reaped emolument in a foreign country: the
+principle is to encourage literature by giving it all the advantages it
+can obtain.
+
+If these views are correct, why may not an English writer secure a right
+in this country, by selling it in season, to a citizen here? An
+equitable trust might not, probably would not be sufficient; but a _bona
+fide_ transfer for a valuable consideration, I begin to think, would. It
+seems to me that all the misconception which has existed on this point
+has arisen from supposing that the term _publication_ refers to other
+than a publication in the country. But, when one remembers how rare it
+is to get lawyers to agree on a question like this, it becomes a layman
+to advance his opinion with great humility. I suppose, after all a good
+way of getting an accurate notion of the meaning of the law, would be to
+toss a dollar into the air, and cry "heads," or "tails." Sir Walter
+Scott seemed fully aware of the great circulation of his books in
+America, as well as how much he lost by not being able to secure a
+copyright. Still he admitted they produced him something. Our
+conversation on this subject terminated by a frank offer, on his part,
+of aiding me with the publishers of his own country;[16] but, although
+grateful for the kindness, I was not so circumstanced as to be able to
+profit by it.
+
+[Footnote 16: An offer that was twice renewed, after intervals of several
+years.]
+
+He did not appear to me to be pleased with Paris. His notions of the
+French were pretty accurate, though clearly not free from the old
+fashioned prejudices. "After all," he remarked, "I am a true Scot,
+never, except on this occasion, and the short visit I made to Paris in
+1815, having been out of my own country, unless to visit England, and I
+have even done very little of the latter." I understood him to say he
+had never been in Ireland, at all.
+
+I met him once more, in the evening, at the hotel of the Princesse ----.
+The party had been got together in a hurry, and was not large. Our
+hostess contrived to assemble some exceedingly clever people, however,
+among whom were one or two women, who are already historical, and whom I
+had fancied long since dead. All the female part of the company, with
+the silent delicacy that the French so well understand, appeared with
+ribbons, hats, or ornaments of some sort or other, of a Scottish stamp.
+Indeed, almost the only woman in the room, that did not appear to be a
+Caledonian was Miss Scott. She was in half-mourning, and, with her black
+eyes and jet-black hair, might very well have passed for a French woman,
+but for a slight peculiarity about the cheek-bones. She looked
+exceedingly well, and was much admired. Having two or three more places
+to go to, they stayed but an hour. As a matter of course, all the French
+women were exceedingly _empressées_ in their manner towards the Great
+Unknown; and as there were three or four that were very exaggerated on
+the score of romance, he was quite lucky if he escaped some absurdities.
+Nothing could be more patient than his manner, under it all; but as soon
+as he very well could, he got into a corner, where I went to speak to
+him. He said, laughingly, that he spoke French with so much difficulty,
+he was embarrassed to answer the compliments. "I am as good a lion as
+needs be, allowing my mane to be stroked as familiarly as they please,
+but I can't growl for them, in French. How is it with you?" Disclaiming
+the necessity of being either a good or a bad lion, being very little
+troubled in that way, for his amusement I related to him an anecdote.
+Pointing out to him a Comtesse de ----, who was present, I told him, I
+had met this lady once a week for several months, and at every _soirée_
+she invariably sailed up to me to say--"Oh, Monsieur ----, quelles
+livres!--vos charmans livres--que vos livres sont charmans!" and I had
+just made up my mind that she was, at least, a woman of taste, when she
+approached me with the utmost _sang-froid_, and cried-- "Bon soir,
+Monsieur ----; je viens d'acheter tous vos livres, et je compte profiter
+de la première occasion pour les lire!"
+
+I took leave of him in the ante-chamber, as he went away, for he was to
+quit Paris the following evening.
+
+Sir Walter Scott's person and manner have been so often described, that
+you will not ask much of me in this way, especially as I saw so little
+of him. His frame is large and muscular, his walk difficult, in
+appearance, though be boasted himself a vigorous mountaineer, and his
+action, in general, measured and heavy. His features and countenance
+were very Scottish, with the short thick nose, heavy lips, and massive
+cheeks. The superior or intellectual part of his head was neither deep
+nor broad, but perhaps the reverse, though singularly high. Indeed, it
+is quite uncommon to see a scull so round and tower-like in the
+formation, though I have met with them in individuals not at all
+distinguished for talents. I do not think a casual observer would find
+anything unusual in the exterior of Sir Walter Scott, beyond his
+physical force, which is great, without being at all extraordinary. His
+eye, however, is certainly remarkable. Grey, small, and without lustre,
+in his graver moments it appears to look inward, instead of regarding
+external objects, in a way, though the expression, more or less, belongs
+to abstraction, that I have never seen equalled. His smile is
+good-natured and social; and when he is in the mood, as happened to be
+the fact so often in our brief intercourse as to lead me to think it
+characteristic of the man, his eye would lighten with a great deal of
+latent fun. He spoke more freely of his private affairs than I had
+reason to expect, though our business introduced the subject naturally;
+and, at such times, I thought the expression changed to a sort of
+melancholy resolution, that was not wanting in sublimity.
+
+The manner of Sir Walter Scott is that of a man accustomed to see much
+of the world without being exactly a man of the world himself. He has
+evidently great social tact, perfect self-possession, is quiet, and
+absolutely without pretension, and has much dignity; and yet it struck
+me that he wanted the ease and _aplomb_ of one accustomed to live with
+his equals. The fact of his being a lion may produce some such effect;
+but I am mistaken if it be not more the influence of early habits and
+opinions than of anything else.
+
+Scott has been so much the mark of society, that it has evidently
+changed his natural manner, which is far less restrained than it is his
+habit to be in the world. I do not mean by this, the mere restraint of
+decorum, but a drilled simplicity or demureness, like that of girls who
+are curbed in their tendency to fun and light-heartedness, by the dread
+of observation. I have seldom known a man of his years, whose manner was
+so different in a _tête-à-tête_, and in the presence of a third person.
+In Edinburgh the circle must be small, and he probably knows every one.
+If strangers do go there, they do not go all at once, and of course the
+old faces form the great majority; so that he finds himself always on
+familiar ground. I can readily imagine that in Auld Reekie, and among
+the proper set, warmed perhaps by a glass of mountain-dew, Sir Walter
+Scott, in his peculiar way, is one of the pleasantest companions the
+world holds.
+
+There was a certain M. de ---- at the _soirée_ of the Princesse ----,
+who has obtained some notoriety as the writer of novels. I had, the
+honour of being introduced to this person, and was much amused with one
+of his questions. You are to understand that the vaguest possible
+notions exist in France on the subject of the United States. Empires,
+states, continents, and islands are blended in inextricable confusion, in
+the minds of a large majority of even the intelligent classes, and we
+sometimes hear the oddest ideas imaginable. This ignorance, quite
+pardonable in part, is not confined to France by any means, but exists
+even in England, a country that ought to know us better. It would seem
+that M. de ----, either because I was a shade or two whiter than
+himself, or because he did not conceive it possible that an American
+could write a book (for in this quarter of the world there is a strong
+tendency to believe that every man whose name crosses the ocean from
+America is merely some European who has gone there), or from some cause
+that to me is inexplicable, took it into his head that I was an
+Englishman who had amused a leisure year or two in the Western
+Hemisphere. After asking me a few questions concerning the country, he
+very coolly continued--"Et combien de temps avez-vous passé en Amérique,
+monsieur?" Comprehending his mistake, for a little practice here makes
+one quick in such matters, I answered, "Monsieur, nous y sommes depuis
+deux siècles." I question if M. de ---- has yet recovered from his
+surprise!
+
+The French, when their general cleverness is considered, are singularly
+ignorant of the habits, institutions, and civilization of other
+countries. This is in part owing to their being little addicted to
+travelling. Their commercial enterprise is not great; for though we
+occasionally see a Frenchman carrying with him into pursuits of this
+nature the comprehensive views, and one might almost say, the
+philosophy, that distinguish the real intelligence of the country, such
+instances are rare, the prevailing character of their commerce being
+caution and close dealing. Like the people of all great nations, their
+attention is drawn more to themselves than to others; and then the want
+of a knowledge of foreign languages has greatly contributed to their
+ignorance. This want of knowledge of foreign languages, in a nation that
+has traversed Europe as conquerors, is owing to the fact that they have
+either carried their own language with them, or met it everywhere. It is
+a want, moreover, that belongs rather to the last generation than to the
+present; the returned emigrants having brought back with them a taste
+for English, German, Italian, and Spanish, which has communicated itself
+to all, or nearly all, the educated people of the country. English, in
+particular, is now very generally studied; and perhaps, relatively, more
+French, under thirty years of age, are to be found in Paris who speak
+English, than Americans, of the same age, are to be found in New York
+who speak French.
+
+I think the limited powers of the language, and the rigid laws to which
+it has been subjected, contribute to render the French less acquainted
+with foreign nations than they would otherwise be. In all their
+translations there is an effort to render the word, however peculiar may
+be its meaning, into the French tongue. Thus, "township" and "city," met
+with in an American book, would probably be rendered by "_canton_" or
+"_commune_" or "_ville_;" neither of which conveys an accurate idea of
+the thing intended. In an English or American book we should introduce
+the French word at once, which would induce the reader to inquire into
+the differences that exist between the minor territorial divisions, of
+his own country, and those of the country of which he is reading. In
+this manner is the door open for further information, until both writers
+and readers come to find it easier and more agreeable to borrow words
+from others, than to curtail their ideas by their national vocabularies.
+The French, however, are beginning to feel their poverty in this
+respect, and some are already bold enough to resort to the natural cure.
+
+The habit of thinking of other nations through their own customs,
+betrays the people of this country into many ridiculous mistakes. One
+hears here the queerest questions imaginable every day; all of which,
+veiled by the good breeding and delicacy that characterize the nation,
+betray an innocent sense of superiority that may be smiled at, and which
+creates no feeling of resentment. A _savant_ lately named to me the
+coasting tonnage of France, evidently with the expectation of exciting
+my admiration; and on my receiving the information coolly, he inquired,
+with a little sarcasm of manner--"Without doubt, you have some coasting
+tonnage also in America?" "The coasting tonnage of the United Slates,
+Monsieur, is greater than the entire tonnage of France." The man looked
+astonished, and I was covered with questions as to the nature of the
+trade that required so much shipping among a population numerically so
+small. It could not possibly be the consumption of a country--he did not
+say it, but he evidently thought it--so insignificant and poor? I told
+him, that bread, wine, and every other article of the first necessity
+excepted, the other consumption of America, especially in luxuries, did
+not fall so much short of that of France as he imagined, owing to the
+great abundance in which the middling and lower classes lived. Unlike
+Europe, articles that were imported were mere necessaries of life, in
+America, such as tea, coffee, sugar, etc. etc., the lowest labourer
+usually indulging in them. He left me evidently impressed with new
+notions, for there is a desire to learn mingled with all their vanity.
+
+But I will relate a laughable blunder of a translator, by way of giving
+you a familiar example of the manner in which the French fall into error
+concerning the condition of other nations, and to illustrate my meaning.
+In one of the recent American novels that have been circulated here, a
+character is made to betray confusion, by tracing lines on the table,
+after dinner, with some wine that had been spilt; a sort of idle
+occupation sufficiently common to allow the allusion to be understood by
+every American. The sentence was faithfully rendered; but, not satisfied
+with giving his original, the translator annexes a note, in which he
+says, "One sees by this little trait, that the use of table-cloths, at
+the time of the American Revolution, was unknown in America!" You will
+understand the train of reasoning that led him to this conclusion. In
+France the cover is laid, perhaps, on a coarse table of oak, or even of
+pine, and the cloth is never drawn; the men leaving the table with the
+women. In America, the table is of highly polished mahogany, the cloth
+is removed, and the men sit, as in England. Now the French custom was
+supposed to be the custom of mankind, and wine could not be traced on
+the wood had there been a cloth; America was a young and semi-civilized
+nation, and, _ergo_, in 1779, there could have been no table-cloths
+known in America!--When men even visit a people of whom they have been
+accustomed to think in this way, they use their eyes through the medium
+of the imagination. I lately met a French traveller who affirmed that
+the use of carpets was hardly known among us.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XIII.
+
+French Manufactures.--Sèvres China.--Tapestry of the Gobelins.--Paper
+for Hangings.--The Savonnerie.--French Carpets.--American Carpets.
+--Transfer of old Pictures from Wood to Canvass.--Coronation Coach.
+--The Arts in France--in America.--American Prejudice.
+
+
+To JAMES E. DE KAY, ESQUIRE.
+
+In my last, I gave you a few examples of the instances in which the
+French have mistaken the relative civilization of their country and
+America, and I shall now give you some in which we have fallen into the
+same error, or the other side of the question.
+
+There has lately been an exhibition of articles of French manufacture,
+at Paris; one of, I believe, the triennial collections of this
+character, that have been established here. The court of the Louvre was
+filled with temporary booths for the occasion, and vast ranges of the
+unfinished apartments in that magnificent palace have been thrown open
+for the same purpose. The court of the Louvre, of itself, is an area
+rather more than four hundred feet square, and I should think fully a
+quarter of a mile of rooms in the building itself are to be added to the
+space occupied for this purpose.
+
+The first idea, with which I was impressed, on walking through the
+booths and galleries, on this occasion, was the great disproportion
+between the objects purely of taste and luxury, and the objects of use.
+The former abounded, were very generally elegant and well-imagined,
+while the latter betrayed the condition of a nation whose civilization
+has commenced with the summit, instead of the base of society.
+
+In France, nearly every improvement in machinery is the result of
+scientific research; is unobjectionable in principles, profound in the
+adaptation of its parts to the end, and commonly beautiful in form. But
+it ends here, rarely penetrating the mass, and producing positive
+results. The Conservatoire des Arts, for instance, is full of beautiful
+and ingenious ploughs; while France is tilled with heavy, costly, and
+cumbrous implements of this nature. One sees light mould turning up,
+here, under a sort of agricultural _diligences_, drawn by four, and even
+six heavy horses, which in America would be done quite as well, and much
+sooner, by two. You know I am farmer enough to understand what I say, on
+a point like this. In France, the cutlery, ironware, glass,
+door-fastenings, hinges, locks, fire-irons, axes, hatchets, carpenter's
+tools, and, in short, almost everything that is connected with homely
+industry and homely comfort, is inferior to the same thing in America.
+It is true, many of our articles are imported, but this produces no
+change in the habits of the respective people; our manufactories are
+merely in Birmingham, instead of being in Philadelphia.
+
+I have now been long enough in France to understand that seeing an
+article in an exhibition like the one I am describing, is no proof that
+it enters at all into the comforts and civilization of the nation,
+although it may be an object as homely as a harrow or a spade. The
+scientific part of the country has little influence, in this way, on the
+operative. The chasm between knowledge and ignorance is so vast in
+France, that it requires a long time for the simplest idea to find its
+way across it.
+
+Exhibitions are everywhere bad guides to the average civilization of a
+country, as it is usual to expose only the objects that have been
+wrought with the greatest care. In a popular sense, they are proofs of
+what can be done, rather than of what _is_ done. The cloths that I saw
+in the booths, for instance, are not to be met with in the shops; the
+specimens of fire-arms, glass, cutlery, etc., etc., too, are all much
+superior to anything one finds on sale. But this is the case everywhere,
+from the boarding-school to the military parade, men invariably putting
+the best foot foremost when they are to be especially inspected. This is
+not the difference I mean. Familiar as every American, at all accustomed
+to the usages of genteel life in his own country, must be with the
+better manufactures of Great Britain, I think he would be struck by the
+inferiority of even the best specimens of the commoner articles that
+were here laid before the public. But when it came to the articles of
+elegance and luxury, as connected with forms, taste, and execution,
+though not always in ingenuity and extent of comfort, I should think
+that no Englishman, let his rank in life be what it would, could pass
+through this wilderness of elegancies without wonder.
+
+Even the manufactures in which we, or rather the English (for I now
+refer more to use than to production), ordinarily excel, such as
+carpets, rugs, porcelain, plate, and all the higher articles of personal
+comfort, _as exceptions_, surpass those of which we have any notion. I
+say, _as exceptions_, not in the sense by which we distinguish the
+extraordinary efforts of the ordinary manufacturer, in order to make a
+figure at an exhibition, but certain objects produced in certain
+exclusive establishments that are chiefly the property of the crown, as
+they have been the offspring of regal taste and magnificence.
+
+Of this latter character is the Sèvres china. There are manufactures of
+this name of a quality that brings them within the reach of moderate
+fortunes, it is true; but one obtains no idea of the length to which
+luxury and taste have been pushed in this branch of art without
+examining the objects made especially for the king, who is in the habit
+of distributing them as presents among the crowned heads and his
+personal favourites. After the ware has been made with the greatest care
+and of the best materials, artists of celebrity are employed to paint
+it. You can easily imagine the value of these articles, when you
+remember that each plate has a design of its own, beautifully executed
+in colours, and presenting a landscape or an historical subject that is
+fit to be framed and suspended in a gallery. One or two of the artists
+employed in this manner have great reputations, and it is no uncommon
+thing to see miniatures in gilded frames which, on examination, prove to
+be on porcelain. Of course the painting has been subject to the action
+of heat in the baking. As respects the miniatures, there is not much to
+be said in their favour. They are well drawn and well enough coloured;
+but the process and the material give them a glossy, unnatural
+appearance, which must prevent them from ever being considered as more
+than so many _tours de force_ in the arts. But on vases, dinner-sets,
+and all ornamental furniture of this nature, in which we look for the
+peculiarities of the material, they produce a magnificence of effect
+that I cannot describe. Vases of the value of ten or fifteen thousand
+francs, or even of more money, are not uncommon; and at the exhibition
+there was a little table, the price of which I believe was two thousand
+dollars, that was a perfect treasure in its way.
+
+Busts, and even statues, I believe, have been attempted in this branch
+of art. This of course is enlisting the statuary as well as the painter
+in its service. I remember to have seen, when at Sèvres, many busts of
+the late Duc de Berri in the process of drying, previously to being put
+into the oven. Our cicerone on that occasion made us laugh by the
+routine with which he went through his catalogue of wonders. He had
+pointed out to us the unbaked busts in a particular room, and on
+entering another apartment, where the baked busts were standing, he
+exclaimed--"Ah! voilà son Altesse Royale toute cuite." This is just the
+amount of the criticism I should hazard on this branch of the Sèvres
+art, or on that which exceeds its legitimate limits--"Behold his Royal
+Highness, ready cooked."
+
+The value of some of the single plates must be very considerable, and
+the king frequently, in presenting a solitary vase, or ornament of the
+Sèvres porcelain, presents thousands.
+
+The tapestry is another of the costly works that it has suited the
+policy of France to keep up, while her ploughs, and axes, and carts, and
+other ordinary implements, are still so primitive and awkward. The
+exhibition contained many specimens from the Gobelins that greatly
+surpassed my expectations. They were chiefly historical subjects, with
+the figures larger than life, and might very well have passed with a
+novice, at a little distance, for oil-paintings. The dimensions of the
+apartment are taken, and the subject is designed, of course, on a scale
+suited to the room. The effect of this species of ornament is very noble
+and imposing, and the tapestries have the additional merit of warmth and
+comfort. Hangings in cloth are very common in Paris, but the tapestry of
+the Gobelins is chiefly confined to the royal palaces. Our neighbour the
+Duc de ---- has some of it, however, in his hotel, a present from the
+king; but the colours are much faded, and the work is otherwise the
+worse for time. I have heard him say that one piece he has, even in its
+dilapidated state, is valued at seven thousand francs. Occasionally a
+little of this tapestry is found in this manner in the great hotels;
+but, as a rule, its use is strictly royal.
+
+The paper for hangings is another article in which the French excel. We
+get very pretty specimens of their skill in this manufacture in America,
+but, with occasional exceptions, nothing that is strictly magnificent
+finds its way into our markets. I was much struck with some of these
+hangings that were made to imitate velvet. The cloth appeared to be
+actually incorporated with the paper, and by no ingenuity of which I was
+master could I detect the means. The style of paper is common enough
+everywhere, but this exhibition had qualities far surpassing anything of
+the sort I had ever before seen. Curiosity has since led me to the
+paper-maker, in order to penetrate the secrets of his art; and there,
+like the affair of Columbus and the egg, I found the whole thing as
+simple as heart could wish. You will probably smile when you learn the
+process by which paper is converted into velvet, which is briefly
+this:--
+
+Wooden moulds are used to stamp the designs, each colour being put on,
+by laying a separate mould on its proper place, one mould being used
+after another, though only one is used on any particular occasion. Thus,
+all the black is put on now, the green to-morrow, and the yellow next
+day. As to the velvets, they are produced as follows:--Wool is chopped
+fine, and dyed the desired hue. I am not certain that cotton, or even
+other materials, may not be used. This chopped and coloured wool is
+thrown into a tub; the mould is covered with some glutinous substance,
+and, when applied, it leaves on the paper the adhesive property, as
+types leave the ink. The paper passes immediately over the tub, and a
+boy throws on the wool. A light blow or two, of a rattan, tosses it
+about, and finally throws all back again into the tub that has not
+touched the glue. The _printed_ part, of course, is covered with blue,
+or purple, or scarlet wood, and is converted, by a touch of the wand,
+into velvet! The process of covering a yard lasts about ten seconds, and
+I should think considerably more than a hundred yards of paper could be
+velvetized in an hour. We laughed at the discovery, and came away
+satisfied that Solomon could have known nothing about manufacturing
+paper-hangings, or he would not have said there was nothing "new under
+the sun."
+
+But the manufacture of France that struck me as being strictly in the
+best taste, in which perfection and magnificence are attained without
+recourse to conceits, or doing violence to any of the proprieties, are
+the products of the Savonnerie, and the exquisitely designed and
+executed works of Beauvais. These include chair bottoms and backs,
+hangings for rooms, and, I believe, carpets. At all events, if the
+carpets do not come from these places, they are quite worthy to have
+that extraction. Flowers, arabesques, and other similar designs,
+exquisitely coloured and drawn, chiefly limit the efforts of the former;
+and the carpets were in single pieces, and made to fit the room. Nothing
+that you have ever seen, or probably have imagined, at all equals the
+magnificence of some of these princely carpets. Indeed, I know nothing
+that runs a closer parallel to the general civilization between France
+and England, and I might almost add of America, than the history of
+their respective carpets. In France, a vast majority of the people
+hardly know what a carpet is. They use mud floors, or, rising a little
+above the very lowest classes, coarse stone and rude tiles are
+substituted. The middling classes, out of the large towns, have little
+else besides painted tiles. The wooden _parquet_ is met with, in all the
+better houses, and is well made and well kept. There is a finish and
+beauty about them, that is not misplaced even in a palace. Among all
+these classes, until quite lately, carpets were unknown, or at least
+they were confined to the very highest class of society. The great
+influx of English has introduced them into the public hotels and common
+lodging-houses; but I have visited among many French of rank and
+fortune, in the dead of winter, and found no carpets. A few of a very
+coarse quality, made of rags, adroitly tortured into laboured designs,
+are seen, it is true, even in indifferent houses; but the rule is as I
+have told you. In short, carpets, in this country, until quite lately,
+have been deemed articles of high luxury; and, like nearly everything
+else that is magnificent and luxurious, at the point where they have
+been taken up, they infinitely exceed anything of the sort in England.
+The classical designs, perfect drawings, and brilliant colours, defeat
+every effort to surpass them,--I had almost said, all competition.
+
+In all America, except in the new regions, with here and there a
+dwelling on the frontier, there is scarcely a house to be found without
+carpets, the owners of which are at all above the labouring classes.
+Even in many of the latter they are to be found. We are carpeted,
+frequently, from the kitchen to the garret; the richness and rarity of
+the manufacture increasing as we ascend in the scale of wealth and
+fashion, until we reach the uttermost limits of our habits--a point
+where beauty and neatness verge upon elegance and magnificence. At this
+point, however, we stop, and the turn of the French commences. Now this
+is the history of the comparative civilization of the two countries, in
+a multitude of other matters; perhaps, it would be better to say, it is
+the general comparative history of the two countries. The English differ
+from us, only, in carrying their scale both higher and lower than
+ourselves; in being sometimes magnificent, and sometimes impoverished;
+but, rarely, indeed, do they equal the French in the light, classical,
+and elegant taste that so eminently distinguishes these people. There is
+something ponderous and purse-proud about the magnificence of England,
+that is scarcely ever visible here; though taste is evidently and
+rapidly on the increase in England on the one hand, as comfort is here
+on the other. The French have even partially adopted the two words
+"fashionable" and "comfortable."
+
+One of the most curious things connected with the arts in France, is
+that of transferring old pictures from wood to canvass. A large
+proportion of the paintings of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries
+were done on wood or copper, and many of the former are, or have been,
+in danger of being lost, from decay. In order to meet the evil, a
+process has been invented by which the painting is transferred to
+canvass, where it remains, to all appearance, as good as ever. I have
+taken some pains to ascertain in what manner this nice operation is
+performed. I have seen pictures in various stages of the process, though
+I have never watched any one through it all; and, in one instance, I saw
+a small Wouvermans stripped to the shirt, if it may be so expressed, or,
+in other words, _when it was nothing but paint_. From what I have seen
+and been told, I understand the mode of effecting this delicate and
+almost incredible operation to be as follows:--
+
+A glue is rubbed over the face of the picture, which is then laid on a
+piece of canvass that is properly stretched and secured, to receive it.
+Weights are now laid on the back of the picture, and it is left for a
+day or two, in order that the glue may harden. The weights are then
+removed, and the operator commences removing the wood, first with a
+plane, and, when he approaches the paint, with sharp delicate chisels.
+The paint is kept in its place by the canvass to which it is glued, and
+which is itself secured to the table; and although the entire body of
+the colours, hardened as it is by time, is usually not thicker than a
+thin wafer, the wood is commonly taken entirely from it. Should a thin
+fragment be left, however, or a crack made in the paint, it is
+considered of no great moment. The Wouvermans alluded to, was pure
+paint, however, and I was shown the pieces of wood, much worm-eaten,
+that had been removed. When the wood is away, glue is applied to the
+_back of the paint_, and to the canvass on which it is intended the
+picture shall remain. The latter is then laid on the paint; new weights
+are placed above it, and they are left two or three days longer, for
+this new glue to harden. When it is thought the adhesion between the
+second canvass and the paint is sufficient, the weights are removed, the
+picture is turned, and warm water is used in loosening the first canvass
+from the face of the picture, until it can be stripped off. More or less
+of the varnish of the picture usually comes off with the glue, rendering
+the separation easier. The painting is then cleaned, retouched, and,
+should it be necessary, varnished and framed; after which it commonly
+looks as well, and is really as sound and as good as ever, so far, at
+least, as the consistency is concerned.
+
+Among other wonders in the exhibition, was the coronation coach of
+Charles X. This carriage is truly magnificent. It is quite large, as
+indeed are all the royal carriages, perhaps as large as an American
+stage-coach; the glass, pure and spotless as air, goes all round the
+upper compartments, so as to admit of a view of the whole interior; the
+panels are beautifully painted in design; the top has gilded and
+well-formed angels blowing trumpets, and the crown of France surmounts
+the centre. The wheels, and train, and pole, are red, striped with gold.
+All the leather is red morocco, gilt, as is the harness. Plumes of
+ostrich feathers ornament the angles, and, altogether, it is a most
+glittering and gorgeous vehicle. The paintings, the gildings, and all
+the details are well executed, except the running gear, which struck me
+as clumsy and imperfect. The cost is said to have been about sixty
+thousand dollars.
+
+Many new rooms in the Louvre were thrown open on this occasion, in order
+that the paintings on their ceilings might be viewed; and as I walked
+through this gorgeous magnificence, I felt how small were our highest
+pretensions to anything like elegance or splendour. The very extreme of
+art, of this nature, may, of itself, be of no great direct benefit, it
+is true; but is should be remembered, that the skill which produces
+these extraordinary fruits, in its road to the higher points of
+magnificence, produces all that embellishes life in the intermediate
+gradations.
+
+In America, in the eagerness of gain, and with the contracted habits
+that a love of gain engenders, which by their own avidity, as is usual
+with the grosser passions, too often defeat their own ends, we overlook
+the vast importance of cultivating the fine arts, even in a pecuniary
+sense, to say nothing of the increased means of enjoying the very money
+that is so blindly pursued, which their possession entails. France is at
+this moment laying all Christendom under contribution, simply by means
+of her taste. Italy, where the arts have flourished still longer, and
+where they have still more effectually penetrated society, would drive
+the English and French out of every market on earth, were the national
+energy at all equal to the national tastes. These things do not as
+exclusively belong to extreme luxury as they may at first seem. Science,
+skill of the nicest investigation, and great research, are all enlisted
+in their behalf; and, in time, implements of the most homely uses derive
+perfection, as by-plays, from the investigations consequent on the
+production of luxuries. It is true, that, by blending a certain amount
+of information with practice, as in the case of the American labourer,
+our wants find the means of furnishing their own supplies; but, apart
+from the fact that the man who makes a chair is not obliged to sit in
+it, and is therefore content to consult his profits merely, the impulses
+of practice are much aided by the accumulated knowledge of study. The
+influence that the arts of design have had on the French manufactures is
+incalculable. They have brought in the aid of chemistry, and
+mathematics, and a knowledge of antiquity; and we can trace the effects
+in the bronzes, the porcelain, the hangings, the chintzes, the silks,
+down to the very ribands of the country. We shall in vain endeavour to
+compete with the great European nations, unless we make stronger efforts
+to cultivate the fine arts. Of what avails our beautiful glass, unless
+we know how to cut it? or of what great advantage, in the strife of
+industry, will be even the _skilful_ glass-cutter, should he not also be
+the _tasteful_ glass-cutter? It is true that classical forms and
+proportions are, as yet, of no great account among us; and the great
+mass of the American people still cling to their own uninstructed
+fancies, in preference to the outlines and proportions of the more
+approved models, and to those hues which art has demonstrated to be
+harmonious. This is the history of every society in its progress to
+perfection; and, cut off as we are from the rest of the civilized world,
+it is not to be expected that we are to make an extraordinary exception.
+But, while we may be satisfied with our own skill and taste, the happy
+lot of all ignorance, our customers will not have the same
+self-complacency, to induce them to become purchasers. We find this
+truth already. We beat all nations in the fabrication of common
+unstamped cottons. Were trade as free as some political economists
+pretend, we should drive all our competitors out of every market, as
+respects this one article. But the moment we attempt to print, or to
+meddle with that part of the business which requires taste, we find
+ourselves inferior to the Europeans, whose forms we are compelled to
+imitate, and of course to receive when no longer novel, and whose hues
+defy our art.
+
+The wisest thing the United States could do, would be to appropriate
+thirty or forty millions to the formation of a marine, not to secure the
+coast, as our hen-roost statesmen are always preaching, but to keep in
+our own hands the control of our own fortunes, by rendering our enmity
+or friendship of so much account to Europe that no power shall ever
+again dare trespass on our national rights:--and one of the next wisest
+measures, I honestly believe, would be to appropriate at once a million
+to the formation of a National Gallery, in which copies of the antique,
+antiques themselves, pictures, bronzes, arabesques, and other models of
+true taste, might be collected, before which the young aspirants for
+fame might study, and with which become imbued, as the preliminary step
+to an infusion of their merits into society. Without including the vast
+influence of such a cultivation on the manners, associations,
+intellects, and habits of the people--an influence that can scarcely be
+appreciated too highly--fifty years would see the first cost returned
+fifty-fold in the shape of the much-beloved dollars. Will this happen?
+Not till men of enlightened minds--_statesmen_, instead of _political
+partizans_--are sent to Washington. It is the misfortune of America to
+lie so remote from the rest of the civilized world, as to feel little of
+the impulses of a noble competition, our rivalry commonly limiting
+itself to the vulgar exhibitions of individual vanity; and this the more
+to our disadvantage, as, denied access to the best models for even this
+humble species of contention with the antagonists we are compelled to
+choose, victory is as bad as defeat.
+
+One of the great impediments to a high class of improvement in America,
+is the disposition to resent every intimation that we can be any better
+than we are at present. Few, perhaps no country, has ever enduced so
+much evil-disposed and unmerited abuse as our own. It is not difficult
+to trace the reasons, and every American should meet it with a just and
+manly indignation. But, being deemed a nation of rogues, barbarous, and
+manifesting the vices of an ancestry of convicts, is a very different
+thing from standing at the head of civilization. This tendency to repel
+every suggestion of inferiority is one of the surest signs of provincial
+habits; it is exactly the feeling with which the resident of the village
+resents what he calls the airs of the town, and that which the inland
+trader brings with him among those whom he terms the "dandies" of the
+sea-board. In short, it is the jealousy of inferiority on the exciting
+points; whatever may be the merits of its subject in other matters, and
+furnishes of itself the best possible proof that there is room for
+amendment. The French have a clever and pithy saying, that of--"On peut
+tout dire à un grand peuple." "One may tell all to a great nation."[17]
+
+[Footnote 17:--Every one was telling me that I should find the country so
+altered after an absence of eight years, that I should not know it.
+Altered, indeed, I found it, but not quite so evidently improved. It
+struck me that there was a vast expansion of mediocrity that was well
+enough in itself, but which was so overwhelming as nearly to overshadow
+everything that once stood prominent as more excellent. This was perhaps
+no more than a natural consequence of the elasticity and growth of a
+young, vigorous community, which, in its agregate character, as in that
+of its individuals, must pass through youth to arrive at manhood. Still
+it was painful and doubly so to one coming from Europe. I saw the towns
+increased, more tawdry than ever, but absolutely with less real taste
+than they had in my youth. The art of painting alone appeared to me to
+have made any material advances in the right direction, if one excepts
+increase in wealth, and in the facilities to create wealth. The
+steam-boats were the only objects that approached magnificence; but
+while they had increased in show, they had less comfort and
+respectability. The taverns, as a whole, had deteriorated; though the
+three first I happened to enter might well compete with a very high
+class of European inns, viz. Head's, Barnum's, and Gadsby's.]
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XIV.
+
+False Notions.--Continental Manners.--People of Paris.--Parisian Women.
+--French Beauty.--Men of France.--French Soldiers.
+
+
+To JAMES STEVENSON, ESQUIRE, ALBANY.
+
+I cannot tell you whence the vulgar notions that we entertain of the
+French, which, with many other pernicious prejudices, have made a part
+of our great inheritance from England, have been originally obtained.
+Certainly I have seen no thing, nor any person, after a long residence
+in the country, to serve as models to the flippant _marquis_, the
+overdressed courtiers, or the _petites maîtresses_ of the English
+dramatists. Even a French _perruquier_ is quite as homely and plain a
+personage as an English or an American barber. But these Athenians
+grossly caricature themselves as well as their neighbours. Although
+Paris is pretty well garnished with English of all degrees, from the
+Duke down, it has never yet been my luck to encounter an English dandy.
+Now and then one meets with a "_dresser_," a man who thinks more of his
+appearance than becomes his manhood, or than comports with good
+breeding; and occasionally a woman is seen who is a mere appendage to
+her attire; but I am persuaded, that, as a rule, neither of these vulgar
+classes exists among people of any condition, in either country. It is
+impossible for me to say what changes the revolution, and the wars and
+the new notions, may have produced in France, but there is no sufficient
+reason for believing that the present cropped and fringeless,
+bewhiskered, and _laceless_ generation of France, differs more from
+their bewigged, belaced, and powdered predecessors, than the men and
+women of any other country differ from their particular ancestors. Boys
+wore cocked hats, and breaches, and swords, in America, previously to
+the revolution; and our immediate fathers flourished in scarlet coats,
+powder, ruffled fingers, and embroidered waistcoats.
+
+The manners of the continent of Europe are more finished than those of
+England, and while quiet and simplicity are the governing rules of good
+breeding everywhere, even in unsophisticated America, this quiet and
+simplicity is more gracious and more graceful in France than in the
+neighbouring island. As yet, I see no other difference in mere
+deportment, though there is abundance when one goes into the examination
+of character.
+
+I have met with a good many people of the old court at Paris, and though
+now and then there is a certain _roué_ atmosphere about them, both men
+and women, as if too much time had been passed at Coblentz, they have
+generally, in other respects, been models of elegant demeanour. Usually
+they are simple, dignified, and yet extremely gracious--gracious without
+the appearance of affability, a quality that is almost always indicative
+of a consciousness of superiority. The predominant fault of manner here
+is too strong a hand in applying flattery; but this is as much the fault
+of the head as of breeding. The French are fond of hearing pleasant
+things. They say themselves that "a Frenchman goes into society to make
+himself agreeable, and an Englishman to make himself disagreeable;" and
+the _dire_ is not altogether without foundation in truth. I never met a
+Frenchman in society here, who appeared to wish to enhance his
+importance by what are called "airs," though a coxcomb in feeling is an
+animal not altogether unknown to the natural history of Paris, nor is
+the zoological science of M. Cuvier indispensable to his discovery.
+
+I shall probably surprise you with one of my opinions. I think the
+population of Paris, physically speaking, finer than that of London.
+Fine men and fine women are, by no means, as frequent, after allowing
+for the difference in whole numbers, in the French, as in the English
+capital; but neither are there as many miserable, pallid, and squalid
+objects. The French are a smaller race than the English, much smaller
+than the race of English gentlemen, so many of whom congregate at
+London; but the population of Paris has a sturdy, healthful look, that I
+do not think is by any means as general in London. In making this
+comparison, allowance must be made for the better dress of the English,
+and for their fogs, whose effect is to bleach the skin and to give a
+colour that has no necessary connexion with the springs of life,
+although the female portion of the population of Paris has probably as
+much colour as that of London. It might possibly be safer to say that
+the female population of Paris is finer than that of London, though I
+think on the whole the males may be included also. I do not mean by
+this, that there is relatively as much female beauty in Paris as in
+London, for in this respect the latter has immeasurably the advantage;
+but, looks apart, that the _physique_ of the French of Paris is superior
+to that of the English of London. The population of Paris is a
+favourable specimen of that of the kingdom; while that of London,
+Westminster excepted, is not at all above the level of the entire
+country, if indeed it be as good.[18]
+
+[Footnote 18: This opinion remains the same in the writer, who between
+the years 1806 and 1833 has been six times in London, and between the
+years 1826 and 1833, five times in Paris. In 1833 he left Paris for
+London, sailing for home from the latter place. A few days after his
+arrival he went to Washington, where _during the session of Congress_,
+dress and air not considered, he thought he had never met so large a
+proportion of fine men in any part of the world. He was particularly
+struck with their size, as was an American friend who was with him, and
+who had also passed many years abroad, having left Liverpool the same
+day the writer sailed from Portsmouth.]
+
+The very general notion which exists in America, that the French are a
+slightly-built, airy people, and that their women in particular are thin
+and without _embonpoint_, is a most extraordinary one, for there is not
+a particle of foundation for it. The women of Paris are about as tall as
+the women of America, and, could a fair sample of the two nations be
+placed in the scales, I have no doubt it would be found that the French
+women would outweigh the Americans in the proportion of six to five.
+Instead of being meagre, they are compactly built, with good busts,
+inclining to be full, and well-limbed, as any one may see who will take
+the trouble to walk the streets after a hard shower; for, as Falstaff
+told Prince Henry, "You are straight enough in the shoulders; you care
+not who sees your back." Indeed, I know no females to whom the opinion
+which we entertain of the French women may better apply than to our own,
+and yet I know none who are so generally well-looking.
+
+The French are not a handsome nation. Personal beauty in either sex is
+rare: there is a want of simplicity, of repose, of dignity, and even of
+harmonious expression, what they themselves call _finesse_, in their
+countenances, and yet the liveliness of the eyes and the joyous
+character of their looks render them agreeable. You are not to
+understand from this that great personal beauty does not exist in
+France, however, for there are so many exceptions to the rule, that they
+have occasionally made me hesitate about believing it a rule at all. The
+French often possess a feature in great perfection that is very rare in
+England, where personal beauty is so common in both sexes. It is in the
+mouth, and particularly in the smile. Want of _finesse_ about the mouth
+is a general European deficiency (the Italians have more of it than any
+other people I know), and it is as prevalent an advantage in America.
+But the races of Saxon root fail in the chin, which wants nobleness and
+volume. Here it is quite common to see profiles that would seem in their
+proper places on a Roman coin.
+
+Although female beauty is not common in France, when it is found, it is
+usually of a very high order. The sweet, cherub-like, guileless
+expression that belongs to the English female face, and through it to
+the American, is hardly ever, perhaps never, met with here. The French
+countenance seldom conveys the idea of extreme infantile innocence. Even
+in the children there is a _manner_ which, while it does not absolutely
+convey an impression of an absence of the virtues, I think leaves less
+conviction of its belonging to the soul of the being, than the peculiar
+look I mean. One always sees _woman_--modest, amiable, _spirituelle_,
+feminine and attractive, if you will, in a French girl; while one
+sometimes sees an _angel_ in a young English or American face. I have no
+allusion now to religious education, or to religious feelings, which are
+quite as general in the sex, particularly the young of good families,
+under their characteristic distinctions, here as anywhere else. In this
+particular the great difference is, that in America it is religion, and
+in France it is infidelity, that is metaphysical.
+
+There is a coquettish prettiness that is quite common in France, in
+which air and manner are mingled with a certain sauciness of expression
+that is not easily described, but which, while it blends well enough
+with the style of the face, is rather pleasing than captivating. It
+marks the peculiar beauty of the _grisette_, who, with her little cap,
+hands stuck in the pockets of her apron, mincing walk, coquettish eye,
+and well-balanced head, is a creature perfectly _sui generis_. Such a
+girl is more like an actress imitating the character, than one is apt to
+imagine the character itself. I have met with imitators of these roguish
+beauties in a higher station, such as the wives and daughters of the
+industrious classes, as it is the fashion to call them here, and even
+among the banking community, but never among women of condition, whose
+deportment in France, whatever may be their morals, is usually marked by
+gentility of air, and a perfectly good tone of manner, always excepting
+that small taint of _rouéism_ to which I have already alluded, and which
+certainly must have come from the camp and emigration.
+
+The highest style of the French beauty is the classical. I cannot recall
+a more lovely picture, a finer union of the grand and the feminine, than
+the Duchesse de ----, in full dress, at a carnival ball, where she shone
+peerless among hundreds of the _élite_ of Europe. I see her now, with
+her small, well-seated head; her large, dark, brilliant eye, rivetted on
+the mazes of a _Polonaise_, danced in character; her hair, black as the
+raven's wing, clustering over a brow of ivory; her graceful form
+slightly inclining forward in delighted and graceful attention; her
+features just Grecian enough to be a model of delicate beauty, just
+Roman enough to be noble; her colour heightened to that of youth by the
+heat of the room, and her costume, in which all the art of Paris was
+blended with a critical knowledge of the just and the becoming. And yet
+this woman was a grandmother!
+
+The men of France have the same physical and the same conventional
+peculiarities as the women. They are short, but sturdy. Including all
+France, for there is a material difference in this respect between the
+north and the south, I should think the average stature of the French
+men (not women) to be quite an inch and a half below the average stature
+of America, and possibly two inches. At home, I did not find myself
+greatly above the medium height, and in a crowd I was always compelled
+to stand on tiptoe to look over the heads of those around me; whereas,
+here, I am evidently _un grand_, and can see across the Champs Elysées
+without any difficulty. You may remember that I stand as near as may be
+to five feet ten; it follows that five feet ten is rather a tall man in
+France. You are not to suppose, however, that there are not occasionally
+men of great stature in this country. One of the largest men I have ever
+seen appears daily in the garden of the Tuileries, and I am told he is a
+Frenchman of one of the north-eastern provinces. That part of the
+kingdom is German rather than French, however, and the population still
+retain most of the peculiarities of their origin.
+
+The army has a look of service and activity rather than of force. I
+should think it more formidable by its manoeuvres than its charges.
+Indeed, the tactics of Napoleon, who used the legs of his troops more
+than their muskets, aiming at concentrating masses on important points,
+goes to show that he depended on alertness instead of _bottom_. This is
+just the quality that would be most likely to prevail against your
+methodical, slow-thinking, and slow-moving German; and I make no
+question the short, sturdy, nimble legs of the little warriors of this
+country have gained many a field.
+
+A general officer, himself a six-footer, told me, lately, that they had
+found the tall men of very little use in the field, from their inability
+to endure the fatigues of a campaign. When armies shall march on
+railroads, and manoeuvre by steam, the grenadiers will come in play
+again; but as it is, the French are admirably adapted by their
+_physique_ to return the career that history has given them. The Romans
+resembled them in this respect, Cicero admitting that many people
+excelled them in size, strength, beauty, and even learning, though he
+claimed a superiority for his countrymen, on the score of love of
+country and reverence for the gods. The French are certainly patriotic
+enough, though their reverence for the gods may possibly be questioned.
+
+The regiments of the guards, the heavy cavalry, and the artillery are
+all filled with men chosen with some care. These troops would, I think,
+form about an average American army, on the score of size. The
+battalions of the line receive the rest. As much attention is bestowed
+in adapting the duty to the _physique_, and entire corps are composed of
+men of as nearly as possible the same physical force, some of the
+regiments certainly make but an indifferent figure, as to dimensions,
+while others appear particularly well. Still, if not overworked, I
+should think these short men would do good service. I think I have seen
+one or two regiments, in which the average height has not exceeded five
+feet three inches. The chances of not being hit in such a corps are
+worth something, for the proportion, compared to the chances in a corps
+of six-footers, is as sixty-three to seventy-two, or is one-eighth in
+favour of the Lilliputians. I believe the rule for retreating is when
+one-third of the men are _hors de combat_.
+
+Now, supposing a regiment of three thousand grenadiers were obliged to
+retire with a loss of one thousand men, the little fellows, under the
+same fire, should have, at the same time, two thousand one hundred and
+thirty-seven sound men left, and of course, unless bullied out of it,
+they ought to gain the day.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XV.
+
+Perversion of Institutions.--The French Academy.--Laplace.--Astronomy.
+--Theatres of Paris.--Immoral Plot.--Artificial Feelings.--French
+Tragedy.--Literary Mania.--The American Press.--American
+Newspapers.--French Journals--Publishing Manoeuvres.--Madame Malibran.
+
+
+To JAMES E. DE KAY, ESQUIRE.
+
+It appears to be the melancholy lot of humanity, that every institution
+which ingenuity can devise shall be perverted to an end different from
+the legitimate. If we plan a democracy, the craven wretch who, in a
+despotism, would be the parasite of a monarch, heads us off, and gets
+the best of it under the pretence of extreme love for the people; if we
+flatter ourselves that by throwing power into the hands of the rich and
+noble, it is put beyond the temptation to abuse it, we soon discover
+that rich is a term of convention, no one thinking he has enough until
+he has all, and that nobility of station has no absolute connexion with
+nobleness of spirit or of conduct; if we confide all to one, indolence,
+favouritism, and indeed the impossibility of supervision, throws us
+again into the hands of the demagogue, in his new, or rather true
+character of a courtier. So it is with life; in politics, religion,
+arms, arts and letters, yea, even the republic of letters, as it is
+called, is the prey of schemes and parasites, and things _in fact_, are
+very different from things _as they seem to be_.
+
+"In the seventeen years that I have been a married man," said Captain
+---- of the British navy, "I have passed but seventeen months with my
+wife and family," "But, now there is peace, you will pass a few years
+quietly in America, to look after your affairs," said I, by way of
+awkward condolence. "No, indeed; I shall return to England as soon as
+possible, to make up for lost time. I have been kept so much at sea,
+that they have forgotten me at home, and duty to my children requires
+that I should be on the spot." In the simplicity of my heart, I thought
+this strange, and yet nothing could be more true. Captain ---- was a
+scion of the English aristocracy, and looked to his sword for his
+fortune. Storms, fagging, cruising, all were of small avail compared to
+interest at the Admiralty, and so it is with all things else, whether in
+Europe or America. The man who really gains the victory, is lucky,
+indeed, if he obtain the meed of his skill and valour. You may be
+curious to know of what all this is _à propos?_ To be frank with, you, I
+have visited the French Academy--"ces quarante qui ont l'esprit comme
+quatre," and have come away fully impressed with the vanity of human
+things!
+
+The occasion was the reception of two or three new members, when,
+according to a settled usage, the successful candidates pronounced
+eulogies on their predecessors. You may be curious to know what
+impression the assembled genius of France produced on a stranger from
+the western world. I can only answer, none. The Academy of the Sciences
+can scarcely ever be less than distinguished in such a nation; but when
+I came to look about me, and to inquire after the purely literary men, I
+was forcibly struck with the feebleness of the catalogue of names. Not
+one in five was at all known to me, and very few, even of those who
+were, could properly be classed among the celebrated writers of the day.
+As France has many very clever men who were not on the list, I was
+desirous of knowing the reason, and then learned that intrigue,
+court-favour, and "_log-rolling_" to use a quaint American term, made
+members of the academy as well as members of the cabinet. A moment's
+reflection might have told me it could not well be otherwise. It would
+be so in America, if we were burthened with an academy; it is so as
+respects collegiate honours; and what reason is there for supposing it
+should not be so in a country so notoriously addicted to intrigue as
+France?
+
+One ought not to be the dupe of these things. There are a few great
+names, distinguished by common consent, whose claims it is necessary to
+respect. These men form the front of every honorary institution; if
+there are to be knights and nobles, and academicians, they must be of
+the number; not that such distinctions are necessary to them, but that
+they are necessary to the distinctions; after which the _oi polloi_ are
+enrolled as they can find interest. Something very like an admission of
+this is contained in an inscription on the statue of Molière, which
+stands in the vestibule of the hall of the Academy, which frankly says,
+"Though we are not necessary to your glory, you are necessary to ours."
+He was excluded from the forty, by intrigue, on account of his
+profession being that of a player. Shakspeare, himself, would have fared
+no better. Now, fancy a country in which there was a club of select
+authors, that should refuse to enrol the name of William Shakspeare on
+their list!
+
+The sitting was well attended, and I dare say the addresses were not
+amiss; though there is something exceedingly tiresome in one of these
+eulogies, that is perpetrated by malice prepense. The audience applauded
+very much, after the fashion of those impromptus which are made _à
+loisir_, and I could not but fancy that a good portion of the assembly
+began to think the Academy was what the cockneys call a _rum_ place,
+before they heard the last of it. We had a poem by Comte Daru, to which
+I confess I did not listen, notwithstanding my personal respect for the
+distinguished writer, simply because I was most heartily wearied before
+he began, and because I can never make anything of French poetry, in the
+Academy or out of it.
+
+It would be unjust to speak lightly of any part of the French Academy,
+without a passing remark in honour of those sections of it to which
+honour is due. In these sections may be included, I think, that of the
+arts, as well as that of the sciences. The number of respectable artists
+that exist in this country is perfectly astonishing. The connoisseurs, I
+believe, dispute the merits of the school, and ignorant as I am, in such
+matters, I can myself see that there is a prevalent disposition, both in
+statuary and painting, to sacrifice simplicity to details, and that the
+theatrical is sometimes mistaken for the grand; but, after admitting
+both these faults, and some defects in colouring, there still remains a
+sufficient accumulation of merit, to create wonder in one, like myself,
+who has not had previous opportunities of ascertaining the affluence of
+a great nation in this respect.
+
+As regards the scientific attainments of the French, it is unnecessary
+to say anything; though I believe you will admit that they ought at
+least to have the effect of counteracting some of the prejudices about
+dancing-masters, _petits maîtres_, and _perruquiers_, that have
+descended to us, through English novels and plays. Such a man as
+Laplace, alone, is sufficient to redeem an entire people from these
+imputations. The very sight of one of his demonstrations will give
+common men, like ourselves, headaches, and you will remember that having
+successfully got through one of the toughest of them, he felicitated
+himself that there was but one other man living who could comprehend it,
+now it was made.
+
+What a noble gift would it have been to his fellow-creatures, had some
+competent follower of Laplace bestowed on them a comprehensive but
+popular compend of the leading astronomical facts, to be used as one of
+the most ordinary school-books! Apart from the general usefulness of
+this peculiar species of knowledge, and the chances that, by thus
+popularizing the study, sparks might be struck from the spirit of some
+dormant Newton, I know no inquiry that has so strong a tendency to raise
+the mind from the gross and vulgar pursuits of the world, to a
+contemplation of the power and designs of God. It has often happened to
+me, when, filled with wonder and respect for the daring and art of man,
+I have been wandering through the gorgeous halls of some palace, or
+other public edifice, that an orrery or a diagram of the planetary
+system has met my eye, and recalled me, in a moment, from the
+consideration of art, and its intrinsic feebleness, to that of the
+sublimity of nature. At such times, this globe has appeared so
+insignificant, in comparison with the mighty system of which it forms so
+secondary a part, that I felt a truly philosophical indifference, not to
+give it a better term, for all it contained. Admiration of human powers,
+as connected with the objects around me, has been lost in admiration of
+the mysterious spirit which could penetrate the remote and sublime
+secrets of the science; and on no other occasions have I felt so
+profound a conviction of my own isolated insignificance, or so lively a
+perception of the stupendous majesty of the Deity.
+
+Passing by the common and conceded facts of the dimensions of the
+planets, and the extent of their orbits, what thoughts are awakened by
+the suggestion that the fixed stars are the centres of other solar
+systems, and the eccentric comets are links to connect them all in one
+great and harmonious design! The astronomers tell us that some of these
+comets have no visible nucleuses--that the fixed stars are seen through
+their apparent densest parts, and that they can be nothing but luminous
+gases; while, on the other hand, others do betray dark compact bodies of
+more solid matter. Fixed stars unaccountably disappear, as if suddenly
+struck out of their places. Now, we know that aerolites are formed in
+the atmosphere by a natural process, and descend in masses of pure iron.
+Why may not the matter of one globe, dispersed into its elements by the
+fusion of its consummation, reassemble in the shape of comets, gaseous
+at first, and slowly increasing and condensing in the form of solid
+matter, varying in their course as they acquire the property of
+attraction, until they finally settle into new and regular planetary
+orbits by the power of their own masses, thus establishing a regular
+reproduction of worlds to meet the waste of eternity? Were the earth
+dissolved into gases by fusion, what would become of its satellite the
+moon? Might not the principles of our planet, thus volatilized, yield to
+its nearer attraction, assemble around that orb, which, losing its
+governing influence, should be left to wander in infinite space, subject
+to a new but eccentric law of gravity, until finally reduced again
+within the limits of some new system? How know we that such is not the
+origin of comets?
+
+Many astronomers have believed that the solar system, in company with
+thousands of other systems, revolves around a common centre, in orbits
+so vast as to defy computation, and a religious sentiment might well
+suggest that this centre of the universe is the throne of the Most High.
+Here we may fancy the Deity seated in power, and controlling, by his
+will, the movements of worlds, directing each to the completion of his
+own mysterious and benevolent designs.
+
+It certainly might be dangerous to push our speculations too far, but
+there can be no risk in familiarizing men to consider the omnipotence of
+God, and to feel their own comparative insignificance. What ideas of
+vastness are obtained by a knowledge of the fact that there exist stars
+in the firmament which ordinary telescopes show us only as single
+bodies, but which, on examination, by using reflectors of a higher
+power, are found to be clusters of orbs--clusters of worlds--or clusters
+of suns! These, again, are found to be _binary_ stars, or two stars
+revolving round each other, while they are thought, at the same time, to
+revolve around their central sun, and accompanied by this again,
+probably, to revolve round the great common centre of all!
+
+But, in the words of the quaint old song, I must cry "Holla! my fancy,
+whither dost thou go?" Before taking leave of the stars altogether,
+however, I will add that the French, and I believe all Europe, with the
+exception of England, follow the natural order of time, in counting the
+seasons. Thus the spring commences with the vernal equinox, and the
+autumn with the autumnal. This division of the year leaves nearly the
+whole of March as a winter month, June as a spring month, and September
+as belonging to the summer. No general division of the seasons can suit
+all latitudes; but the equinoxes certainly suggest the only two great
+events of the year, that equally affect the entire sphere. Had the old
+method of computing time continued, the seasons would gradually have
+made the circle of the months, until their order was reversed as they
+are now known to be in the northern and southern hemispheres.
+
+Quitting the Academy, which, with its schools of the classical and the
+romantic, has tempted me to a higher flight than I could have believed
+possible, let us descend to the theatres of Paris. Talma was still
+playing last year, when we arrived, and as in the case of repentance, I
+put off a visit to the Théâtre Français, with a full determination to
+go, because it might be made at any time. In the meanwhile, he fell ill
+and died, and it never was my good fortune to see that great actor.
+Mademoiselle Mars I have seen, and, certainly, in her line of
+characters, I have never beheld her equal. Indeed, it is scarcely
+possible to conceive of a purer, more severe, more faultless, and yet
+more poetical representation of common nature, than that which
+characterizes her art. Her acting has all the finish of high breeding,
+with just as much feeling as is necessary to keep alive the illusion. As
+for rant, there is not as much about her whole system, as would serve a
+common English, or American actress, for a single "length."
+
+To be frank with you, so great is the superiority of the French actors,
+in _vaudevilles_, the light opera, and genteel comedy, that I fear I
+have lost my taste for the English stage. Of tragedy I say nothing, for
+I cannot enter into the poetry of the country at all, but, in all below
+it, these people, to my taste, are immeasurably our superiors; and by
+_ours_, you know I include the English stage. The different lines here,
+are divided among the different theatres; so that if you wish to laugh,
+you can go to the Variétés; to weep, to the Théâtre Français; or, to
+gape, to the Odéon. At the Porte St. Martin, one finds vigorous touches
+of national character, and at the Gymnase, the fashionable place of
+resort, just at this moment, national traits polished by convention.
+Besides these, there are many other theatres, not one of which, in its
+way, can be called less than tolerable.
+
+One can say but little in favour of the morals of too many of the pieces
+represented here. In this particular there is a strange obliquity of
+reason, arising out of habitual exaggeration of feeling, that really
+seems to disqualify most of the women, even from perceiving what is
+monstrous, provided it be sentimental and touching. I was particularly
+advised to go to the Théâtre Madame to see a certain piece by a
+_côterie_ of very amiable women, whom I met the following night at a
+house where we all regularly resorted, once a week. On entering, they
+eagerly inquired if "I had not been charmed, fascinated; if any thing
+could be better played, or more touching?" Better played it could not
+easily be, but I had been so shocked with the moral of the piece, that I
+could scarcely admire the acting. "The moral! This was the first time
+they had heard it questioned." I was obliged to explain. A certain
+person had been left the protector of a friend's daughter, then an
+infant. He had the child educated as his sister, and she grew to be a
+woman, ignorant of her real origin. In the meantime, she has offers of
+marriage, all of which she unaccountably refuses. In fine, she was
+secretly cherishing a passion for her guardian _and supposed brother_;
+an explanation is had, they marry, and the piece closes. I objected to
+the probability of a well-educated young woman's falling in love with a
+man old enough to be selected as her guardian, when she was an infant,
+and against whom there existed the trifling objection of his being her
+own brother.
+
+"But he was _not_ her brother--not even a relative." "True; but she
+_believed_ him to be her brother." "And nature--do you count nature as
+nothing?--a _secret sentiment_ told her he was not her brother." "And
+use, and education, and an _open sentiment_, and all the world told her
+he was. Such a woman was guilty of a revolting indelicacy and a heinous
+crime, and no exaggerated representation of love, a passion of great
+purity in itself, can ever do away with the shocking realities of such a
+case."
+
+I found no one to agree with me. He was _not_ her brother, and though
+his tongue and all around her told her he was, her heart, that
+infallible guide, told her the truth. What more could any reasonable man
+ask?
+
+It was _à propos_ of this play, and of my objection to this particular
+feature of it, that an exceedingly clever French woman laughingly told
+me she understood there was no such thing as love in America. That a
+people of manners as artificial as the French, should suppose that
+others, under the influence of the cold, formal exterior which the
+puritans have entailed on so large a portion of the public, were without
+strong feeling, is not altogether as irrational as may at first appear.
+Art, in ordinary deportment, is both cause and effect. That which we
+habitually affect to be, gets in the end to be so incorporated with our
+natural propensities as to form a part of the real man. We all know that
+by discipline we can get the mastery of our strongest passions, and, on
+the other hand, by yielding to them and encouraging them, that they soon
+get the mastery over us. Thus do a highly artificial people, fond of,
+and always seeking high excitement, come, in time, to feel it
+artificially, as it were, by natural impulses.
+
+I have mentioned the anecdote of the play, because I think it
+characteristic of a tone of feeling that is quite prevalent among a
+large class of the French, though I am far from saying there is not a
+class who would, at once, see the grave sacrifice of principle that is
+involved, in building up the sentiments of a fiction on such a
+foundation of animal instinct. I find, on recollection, however, that
+Miss Lee, in one of her Canterbury Tales, has made the love of her plot
+hinge on a very similar incident. Surely she must have been under the
+influence of some of the German monstrosities that were so much in
+vogue, about the time she wrote, for even Juvenal would scarcely have
+imagined anything worse, as the subject of his satire.
+
+You will get a better idea of the sentimentalism that more or less
+influences the tables of this country, however, if I tell you that the
+ladies of the _côterie_, in which the remarks on the amorous sister were
+made, once gravely discussed in my presence the question whether Madame
+de Staël was right or wrong, in causing Corinne to go through certain
+sentimental _experiences_, as our canters call it at home, on a clouded
+day, instead of choosing one on which the sun was bright: or, _vice
+versa_; for I really forget whether it was on the "windy side" of
+sensibility or not, that the daughter of Necker was supposed to have
+erred.
+
+The first feeling is that of surprise at finding a people so artificial
+in their ordinary deportment, so chaste and free from exaggeration in
+their scenic representations of life. But reflection will show us that
+all finish has the effect of bringing us within the compass of severe
+laws, and that the high taste which results from cultivation repudiates
+all excess of mere manner. The simple fact is, that an educated
+Frenchman is a great actor all the while, and that when he goes on the
+stage, he has much less to do to be perfect, than an Englishman who has
+drilled himself into coldness, or an American who looks upon strong
+expressions of feeling as affectation. When the two latter commence the
+business of playing assumed parts, they consider it as a new occupation,
+and go at it so much in earnest, that everybody sees they are acting.[19]
+
+[Footnote 19: Mr. Mathews and Mr. Power were the nearest to the neat
+acting of France of any male English performers the writer ever saw. The
+first sometimes permitted himself to be led astray, by the caricatures
+he was required to represent, and by the tastes of his audience; but the
+latter, so far as the writer has seen him, appears determined to be
+chaste, come what, come will.]
+
+You will remember, I say nothing in favour of the French tragic
+representations. When a great and an intellectual nation, like France,
+unites to applaud images and sentiments that are communicated through
+their own peculiar forms of speech, it becomes a stranger to distrust
+his own knowledge, rather than their taste. I dare say that were I more
+accustomed to the language, I might enjoy Corneille and Racine, and even
+Voltaire, for I can now greatly enjoy Molière; but, to be honest in the
+matter, all reciters of heroic French poetry appear to me to depend on a
+pompous declamation, to compensate for the poverty of the idioms, and
+the want of nobleness in the expressions. I never heard any one, poet or
+actor, he who read his own verses, or he who repeated those of others,
+who did not appear to mouth, and all their tragic playing has had the
+air of being on stilts. Napoleon has said, from the sublime to the
+ridiculous it is but a step. This is much truer in France than in most
+other countries, for the sublime is commonly so sublimated, that it will
+admit of no great increase. Racine, in a most touching scene, makes one
+of his heroic characters offer to wipe off the tears of a heroine lest
+they should discolour her _rouge_! I had a classmate at college, who was
+so very ultra courtly in his language, that he never forgot to say, Mr.
+Julius Caesar, and Mr. Homer.
+
+There exists a perfect mania for letters throughout Europe, in this
+"piping time of peace." Statesmen, soldiers, peers, princes, and kings,
+hardly think themselves _illustrated_, until each has produced his book.
+The world never before saw a tithe of the names of people of condition,
+figuring in the catalogues of its writers. "Some thinks he writes
+Cinna--he owns to Panurge," applies to half the people one meets in
+society. I was at a dinner lately, given by the Marquis de ----, when
+the table was filled with peers, generals, ex-ministers, ex-ambassadors,
+naturalists, philosophers, and statesmen of all degrees. Casting my eyes
+round the circle, I was struck with the singular prevalence of the
+_cacoethes scribendi_, among so many men of different educations,
+antecedents, and pursuits. There was a soldier present who had written
+on taste, a politician on the art of war, a _diplomate_ who had dabbled
+in poetry, and a jurist who pretended to enlighten the world in ethics,
+it was the drollest assemblage in the world, and suggested many queer
+associations, for, I believe, the only man at table, who had not dealt
+in ink, was an old Lieutenant-General, who sat by me, and who, when I
+alluded to the circumstance, strongly felicitated himself that he had
+escaped the mania of the age, as it was an _illustration_ of itself.
+Among the _convives_ were Cuvier, Villemain, Daru, and several others
+who are almost as well known to science and letters.
+
+Half the voluntary visits I receive are preceded by a volume of some
+sort or other, as a token of my new acquaintance being a regularly
+initiated member of the fraternity of the quill. In two or three
+instances, I have been surprised at subsequently discovering that the
+regular profession of the writer is arms, or some other pursuit, in
+which one would scarcely anticipate so strong a devotion to letters. In
+short, such is the actual state of opinion in Europe, that one is hardly
+satisfied with any amount, or any quality of glory, until it is
+consummated by that of having written a book. Napoleon closed his career
+with the quill, and his successor was hardly on his throne, before he
+began to publish. The principal officers of the Empire, and _émigrés_
+without number, have fairly set to work as so many disinterested
+historians, and even a lady, who, by way of abbreviation, is called "The
+Widow of the Grand Army," is giving us regularly volumes, whose
+eccentricities and periodicity, as the astronomers say, can be reduced
+to known laws, by the use of figures.
+
+In the middle ages golden spurs were the object of every man's ambition.
+Without them, neither wealth, nor birth, nor power was properly
+esteemed; and, at the present time, passing from the lance to the pen,
+from the casque and shield to the ink-pot and fool's cap, we all seek a
+passport from the order of Letters. Does this augur good or evil, for
+the world? The public press of France is conducted with great spirit and
+talents, on all sides. It has few points in common with our own, beyond
+the mere fact of its general character. In America, a single literary
+man, putting the best face on it, enters into a compact with some person
+of practical knowledge, a printer perhaps, and together they establish a
+newspaper, the mechanical part of which is confided to the care of the
+latter partner, and the intellectual to the former. In the country, half
+the time, the editor is no other than the printer himself, the division
+of labour not having yet reached even this important branch of industry.
+But looking to the papers that are published in the towns, one man of
+letters is a luxury about an American print. There are a few instances
+in which there are two, or three; but, generally, the subordinates are
+little more than scissors-men. Now, it must be apparent, at a glance,
+that no one individual can keep up the character of a daily print, of
+any magnitude; the drain on his knowledge and other resources being too
+great. This, I take it, is the simple reason why the press of America
+ranks no higher than it does. The business is too much divided; too much
+is required, and this, too, in a country where matters of grave import
+are of rare occurrence, and in which the chief interests are centred in
+the vulgar concerns of mere party politics, with little or no connexion
+with great measures, or great principles. You have only to fancy the
+superior importance that attaches to the views of powerful monarchs, the
+secret intrigues of courts, on whose results, perhaps, depend the
+fortunes of Christendom, and the serious and radical principles that are
+dependent on the great changes of systems that are silently working
+their way, in this part of the world, and which involve material
+alterations in the very structure of society, to get an idea of how much
+more interest a European journal, _ceteris paribus_, must be, compared
+to an American journal, by the nature of its facts alone. It is true
+that we get a portion of these facts, as light finally arrives from the
+remoter stars, but mutilated, and necessarily shorn of much of their
+interest, by their want of importance to our own country. I had been in
+Europe some time, before I could fully comprehend the reason why I was
+ignorant of so many minor points of its political history, for, from
+boyhood up, I had been an attentive reader of all that touched this part
+of the world, as it appeared in our prints. By dint of inquiry, however,
+I believe I have come at the fact. The winds are by no means as regular
+as the daily prints; and it frequently happens, especially in the winter
+and spring months, that five or six packets arrive nearly together,
+bringing with them the condensed intelligence of as many weeks. Now,
+newspaper finders notoriously seek the latest news, and in the hurry and
+confusion of reading and selecting, and bringing out, to meet the wants
+of the day, many of the connecting links are lost, readers get imperfect
+notions of men and things, and, from a want of a complete understanding
+of the matter, the mind gives up, without regret, the little and
+unsatisfactory knowledge it had so casually obtained. I take it, this is
+a principal cause of the many false notions that exist among us, on the
+subject of Europe and its events.
+
+In France, a paper is established by a regular subscription of capital;
+a principal editor is selected, and he is commonly supported, in the
+case of a leading journal, by four or five paid assistants. In addition
+to this formidable corps, many of the most distinguished men of France
+are known to contribute freely to the columns of the prints in the
+interest of their cause.
+
+The laws of France compel a journal that has admitted any statement
+involving facts concerning an individual, to publish his reply, that the
+antidote may meet the poison. This is a regulation that we might adopt
+with great advantage to truth and the character of the country.
+
+There is not at this moment, within my knowledge, a single critical
+literary journal of received authority in all France. This is a species
+of literature to which the French pay but little attention just now,
+although many of the leading daily prints contain articles on the
+principal works as they appear.
+
+By the little that has come under my observation, I should say the
+fraudulent and disgusting system of puffing and of abusing, as interest
+or pique dictates, is even carried to a greater length in France than it
+is in either England or America. The following anecdote, which relates
+to myself, may give you some notion of the _modus operandi_.
+
+All the works I had written previously to coming to Europe had been
+taken from the English editions and translated, appearing simultaneously
+with their originals. Having an intention to cause a new book to be
+printed in English in Paris, for the sake of reading the proofs, the
+necessity was felt of getting some control over the translation, lest,
+profiting by the interval necessary to send the sheets home to be
+reprinted, it might appear as the original book. I knew that the sheets
+of previous books had been purchased in England, and I accordingly sent
+a proposition to the publishers that the next bargain should be made
+with me. Under the impression that an author's price would be asked,
+they took the alarm, and made difficulties. Finding me firm, and
+indisposed to yield to some threats of doing as they pleased, the matter
+was suspended for a few days. Just at this moment, I received through
+the post a single number of an obscure newspaper, whose existence, until
+then, was quite unknown to me. Surprised at such an attention, I was
+curious to know the contents. The journal contained an article on my
+merits and demerits as a writer, the latter being treated with a good
+deal of freedom. When one gets a paper in this manner, containing abuse
+of himself, he is pretty safe in believing its opinions dishonest. But I
+had even better evidence than common in this particular case, for I
+happened to be extolled for the manner in which I had treated the
+character of Franklin, a personage whose name even had never appeared in
+anything I had written. This, of course, settled the character of the
+critique, and the next time I saw the individual who had acted as agent
+in the negociation just mentioned, I gave him the paper, and told him I
+was half disposed to raise my price on account of the pitiful manoeuvre
+it contained. We had already come to terms, the publishers finding that
+the price was little more than nominal, and the answer was a virtual
+conclusion that the article was intended to affect my estimate of the
+value of the intended work in France, and to bring me under subjection
+to the critics.[20]
+
+[Footnote 20: The writer suffers this anecdote to stand as it was written
+nine years since; but since his return home, he has discovered that we
+are in no degree behind the French in the corruption and frauds that
+render the pursuits of a writer one of the most humiliating and
+revolting in which a man of any pride of character can engage, unless he
+resolutely maintains his independence, a temerity that is certain to be
+resented by all those who, unequal to going alone in the paths of
+literature, seek their ends by clinging to those who can, either as
+pirates or robbers.]
+
+I apprehend that few books are brought before the public in France,
+dependent only on their intrinsic merits; and the system of intrigue,
+which predominates in everything, is as active in this as in other
+interests.
+
+In France, a book that penetrates to the provinces may be said to be
+popular; and as for a book coming _from_ the provinces, it is almost
+unheard of. The despotism of the trade on this point is unyielding.
+Paris appears to deem itself the arbiter in all matters of taste and
+literature, and it is almost as unlikely that a new fashion should come
+from Lyon, or Bordeaux, or Marseilles, as that a new work should be
+received with favour that was published in either of those towns. The
+approbation of Paris is indispensable, and the publishers of the
+capital, assisted by their paid corps of puffers and detractors, are
+sufficiently powerful to prevent that potent public, to whom all affect
+to defer, from judging for itself.
+
+We have lately had a proof here of the unwillingness of the Parisians to
+permit others to decide for them, in anything relating to taste, in a
+case that refers to us Americans. Madame Malibran arrived from America a
+few months since. In Europe she was unknown, but the great name of her
+father stood in her stead. Unluckily it was whispered that she had met
+with great success in America. America! and this, too, in conjunction
+with music and the opera! The poor woman was compelled to appear under
+the disadvantage of having brought an American reputation with her, and
+seriously this single fact went nigh to destroy her fortunes. Those
+wretches who, as Coleridge expresses it, are "animalculae, who live by
+feeding on the body of genius," affected to be displeased, and the
+public hesitated, at their suggestions, about accepting an artist from
+the "colonies," as they still have the audacity to call the great
+Republic. I have no means of knowing what sacrifices were made to the
+petty tyrants of the press before this woman, who has the talents
+necessary to raise her to the summit of her profession, was enabled to
+gain the favour of a "_generous and discerning public!_"
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XVI.
+
+Environs of Paris.--Village of St. Ouen.--Our House there.--Life on the
+River.--Parisian Cockneys.--A pretty Grisette.--Voyage across the Seine.
+--A rash Adventurer.--Village Fête.--Montmorency.--View near Paris.
+
+
+TO JAMES STEVENSON, ESQUIRE, ALBANY.
+
+We have been the residents of a French village ever since the 1st of
+June, and it is now drawing to the close of October. We had already
+passed the greater part of a summer, and entire autumn, winter and
+spring, within the walls of Paris, and then we thought we might indulge
+our tastes a little, by retreating to the fields, to catch a glimpse of
+country life. You will smile when I add that we are only a league from
+the Barrière de Clichy. This is the reason I have not before spoken of
+the removal, for we are in town three or four times every week, and
+never miss an occasion, when there is anything to be seen. I shall now
+proceed, however, to let you into the secret of our actual situation.
+
+I passed the month of May examining the environs of the capital in quest
+of an house. As this was an agreeable occupation, we were in no hurry;
+but having set up my cabriolet, we killed two birds with one stone, by
+making ourselves familiarly acquainted with nearly every village or
+hamlet within three leagues of Paris, a distance beyond which I did not
+wish to go.
+
+On the side of St. Cloud, which embraces Passy, Auteuil, and all the
+places that encircle the Bois de Boulogne, the Hyde Park of Paris, there
+are very many pleasant residences, but from one cause or another, no one
+suited us exactly, and we finally took a house in the village of St.
+Ouen, the Runnymeade of France. When Louis XVIII. came, in 1814, to his
+capital, in the rear of the allies, he stopped for a few days at St.
+Ouen, a league from the barriers, where there was a small chateau that
+was the property of the crown. Here he was met by M. de Talleyrand and
+others, and hence he issued the celebrated charter, that is to render
+France for evermore a constitutional country.
+
+The chateau has since been razed, and a pavilion erected in its place,
+which has been presented to the Comtesse de ----, a lady who, reversing
+the ordinary lot of courtiers, is said to cause majesty to live in the
+sunshine of _her_ smiles. What an appropriate and encouraging monument
+to rear on the birth-place of French liberty! At the opposite extremity
+of the village is another considerable house, that was once the dwelling
+of M. Necker, and is now the property and country residence of M.
+Ternaux, or the _Baron_ Ternaux, if it were polite to style him thus,
+the most celebrated manufacturer of France. I say polite, for the mere
+_fanfaronnade_ of nobility is little in vogue here. The wags tell a
+story of some one, who was formally announced as "Monsieur le Marquis
+d'un tel," turning short round on the servant, and exclaiming with
+indignation, "Marquis toi-même!" But this story savours of the
+Bonapartists; for as the Emperor created neither _marquis_ nor
+_vicomtes_, there was a sort of affectation of assuming these titles at
+the restoration as proofs of belonging to the old _régime_.
+
+St. Ouen is a cluster of small, mean, stone houses, stretched along the
+right bank of the Seine, which, after making a circuit of near twenty
+miles, winds round so close to the town again, that they are actually
+constructing a basin, near the village, for the use of the capital; it
+being easier to wheel articles from this point to Paris, than to contend
+with the current and to tread its shoals. In addition to the two houses
+named, however, it has six or eight respectable abodes between the
+street and the river, one of which is our own.
+
+This place became a princely residence about the year 1800, since which
+time it has been more or less frequented as such down to the 4th June,
+1814, the date of the memorable charter.[21] Madame de Pompadour
+possessed the chateau in 1745, so you see it has been "dust to dust"
+with this place, as with all that is frail.
+
+[Footnote 21: The chateau of St. Ouen, rather less than two centuries
+since, passed into the possession of the Duc de Gesvre. Dulaure gives
+the following,--a part of a letter from this nobleman,--as a specimen of
+the education of a _duc_ in the seventeenth century:--"Monsieur, me
+trouvant obligé de randre une bonne party de largan que mais enfant ont
+pris de peuis qu'il sont au campane, monsieur, cela moblige a vous
+suplier tres humblemant monsieur de me faire la grasse de commander
+monsieur quant il vous plera que lon me pay la capitenery de Monsaux
+monsieur vous asseurant que vous mobligeres fort sansiblement monsieur
+comme ausy de me croire avec toute sorte de respec, etc." This beats
+Jack Cade out and out. The great connétable Anne de Montmorency could
+not write his name, and as his signature became necessary, his secretary
+stood over his shoulder to tell him when he had made enough _piès de
+mouche_ to answer the purpose.]
+
+The village of St. Ouen, small, dirty, crowded and unsavoury as it is,
+has a _place_, like every other French village. When we drove into it,
+to look at the house, I confess to having laughed outright, at the idea
+of inhabiting such a hole. Two large _portes-cochères_, however, opened
+from the square, and we were admitted, through the best-looking of the
+two, into a spacious and an extremely neat court. On one side of the
+gate was a lodge for a porter, and on the other, a building to contain
+gardeners' tools, plants, etc. The walls that separate it from the square
+and the adjoining gardens are twelve or fourteen feet high, and once
+within them, the world is completely excluded. The width of the grounds
+does not exceed a hundred and fifty feet; the length, the form being
+that of a parallelogram, may be three hundred, or a little more; and yet
+in these narrow limits, which are planted _à l'Anglaise_, so well is
+everything contrived, that we appear to have abundance of room. The
+garden terminates in a terrace that overhangs the river, and, from this
+point, the eye ranges over a wide extent of beautiful plain, that is
+bounded by fine bold hills which are teeming with gray villages and
+_bourgs_.
+
+The house is of stone, and not without elegance. It may be ninety feet
+in length, by some forty in width. The entrance is into a vestibule,
+which has the offices on the right, and the great staircase on the left.
+The principal _salon_ is in front. This is a good room, near thirty feet
+long, fifteen or sixteen high, and has three good windows, that open on
+the garden. The billiard-room communicates on one side, and the _salle à
+manger_ on the other; next the latter come the offices again, and next
+the billiard-room is a very pretty little boudoir. Up stairs, are suites
+of bed-rooms and dressing-rooms; every thing is neat, and the house is
+in excellent order, and well furnished for a country residence. Now, all
+this I get at a hundred dollars a month, for the five summer months.
+There are also a carriage-house, and stabling for three horses. The
+gardener and porter are paid by the proprietor. The village, however, is
+not in much request, and the rent is thought to be low.
+
+Among the great advantages enjoyed by a residence in Europe, are the
+facilities of this nature. Furnished apartments, or furnished houses,
+can be had in almost every town of any size; and, owning your own linen
+and plate, nearly every other necessary is found you. It is true, that
+one sometimes misses comforts to which he has been accustomed in his own
+house; but, in France, many little things are found, it is not usual to
+meet with elsewhere. Thus, no principal bedroom is considered properly
+furnished in a good house, without a handsome secretary, and a bureau.
+These two articles are as much matters of course, as are the eternal two
+rooms and folding doors, in New York.
+
+This, then, has been our Tusculum since June. M. Ternaux enlivens the
+scene, occasionally, by a dinner; and he has politely granted us
+permission to walk in his grounds, which are extensive and well laid
+out, for the old French style. We have a neighbour on our left, name
+unknown, who gives suppers in his garden, and concerts that really are
+worthy of the grand opera. Occasionally, we get a song, in a female
+voice, that rivals the best of Madame Malibran's. On our right lives a
+staid widow, whose establishment is as tranquil as our own.
+
+One of our great amusements is to watch the _living_ life on the river,
+--there is no _still_ life in France. All the washerwomen of the village
+assemble, three days in the week, beneath our terrace, and a merrier set
+of _grisettes_ is not to be found in the neighbourhood of Paris. They
+chat, and joke, and splash, and scream from morning to night, lightening
+the toil by never-ceasing good humour. Occasionally an enormous
+scow-like barge is hauled up against the current, by stout horses,
+loaded to the water's edge, or one, without freight, comes dropping down
+the stream, nearly filling the whole river as it floats broad-side to.
+There are three or four islands opposite, and, now and then, a small
+boat is seen paddling among them. We have even tried _punting_
+ourselves, but the amusement was soon exhausted.
+
+Sunday is a great day with us, for then the shore is lined with
+Parisians, as thoroughly cockney as if Bow-bells could be heard in the
+Quartier Montmartre! These good people visit us, in all sorts of ways;
+some on donkeys, some in cabriolets, some in fiacres, and by far the
+larger portion on foot. They are perfectly inoffensive and unobtrusive,
+being, in this respect, just as unlike an American inroad from a town as
+can well be. These crowds pass vineyards on their way to us, unprotected
+by any fences. This point in the French character, however, about which
+so much has been said to our disadvantage, as well as to that of the
+English, is subject to some explanation. The statues, promenades,
+gardens, etc. etc. are, almost without exception, guarded by sentinels;
+and then there are agents of the police, in common clothes, scattered
+through the towns, in such numbers as to make depredations hazardous. In
+the country each _commune_ has one, or more, _gardes champêtres_, whose
+sole business it is to detect and arrest trespassers. When to these are
+added the _gendarmes à pied_ and _à cheval_, who are constantly in
+motion, one sees that the risk of breaking the laws is attended with
+more hazard here than with us. There is no doubt, on the other hand,
+that the training and habits, produced by such a system of watchfulness,
+enter so far into the character of the people, that they cease to think
+of doing that which is so strenuously denied them.
+
+Some of our visitors make their appearance in a very quaint style. I met
+a party the other day, among whom the following family arrangement had
+obtained:--The man was mounted on a donkey, with his feet just clear of
+the ground. The wife, a buxom brunette, was trudging afoot in the rear,
+accompanied by the two younger children, a boy and girl, between twelve
+and fourteen, led by a small dog, fastened to a string like the guide of
+a blind mendicant; while the eldest daughter was mounted on the crupper,
+maintaining her equilibrium by a masculine disposition of her lower
+limbs. She was a fine, rosy-cheeked _grisette_, of about seventeen; and,
+as they ambled along, just fast enough to keep the cur on a slow trot,
+her cap flared in the wind, her black eyes flashed with pleasure, and
+her dark ringlets streamed behind her, like so many silken pennants. She
+had a ready laugh for every one she met, and a sort of malicious
+pleasure in asking, by her countenance, if they did not wish they too
+had a donkey? As the seat was none of the most commodious, she had
+contrived to make a pair of stirrups of her petticoats. The gown was
+pinned up about her waist, leaving her knees, instead of her feet, as
+the _points d'appui_. The well-turned legs, and the ankles, with such a
+_chaussure_ as at once marks a Parisienne, were exposed to the
+admiration of a _parterre_ of some hundreds of idle wayfarers. Truly, it
+is no wonder that sculptors abound in this country, for capital models
+are to be found, even in the highways. The donkey was the only one who
+appeared displeased with this _monture_, and he only manifested
+dissatisfaction by lifting his hinder extremities a little, as the man
+occasionally touched his flanks with a nettle, that the ass would much
+rather have been eating.
+
+Not long since I passed half an hour on the terrace, an amused witness
+of the perils of a voyage across the Seine in a punt. The adventurers
+were a _bourgeois_, his wife, sister, and child. Honest Pierre, the
+waterman, had conditioned to take the whole party to the island opposite
+and to return them safe to the main for the modicum of five sous. The
+old fox invariably charged me a franc for the same service. There was
+much demurring, and many doubts about encountering the risk; and more
+than once the women would have receded, had not the man treated the
+matter as a trifle. He affirmed _parole d'honneur_ that his father had
+crossed the Maine a dozen times, and no harm had come of it! This
+encouraged them, and, with many pretty screams, _mes fois_, and _oh,
+Dieu_, they finally embarked. The punt was a narrow scow that a ton
+weight would not have disturbed, the river was so low and sluggish that
+it might have been forded two-thirds of the distance, and the width was
+not three hundred feet. Pierre protested that the danger was certainly
+not worth mentioning, and away he went, as philosophical in appearance
+as his punt. The voyage was made in safety, and the bows of the boat had
+actually touched the shore on its return, before any of the passengers
+ventured to smile. The excursion, like most travelling, was likely to be
+most productive of happiness by the recollections. But the women were no
+sooner landed, than that rash adventurer, the husband, brother, and
+father, seized an oar, and began to ply it with all his force. He merely
+wished to tell his _confrères_ of the Rue Montmartre how a punt might be
+rowed. Pierre had gallantly landed to assist the ladies, and the boat,
+relieved of its weight, slowly yielded to the impulse of the oar, and
+inclined its bows from the land. "Oh! Edouard! mon mari! mon frère!--que
+fais-tu?" exclaimed the ladies. "Ce n'est rien," returned the man,
+puffing, and giving another lusty sweep, by which he succeeded in
+forcing the punt fully twenty feet from the shore. "Edouard! cher
+Edouard!" "Laisse-moi m'amuser,--je m'amuse, je m'amuse," cried the
+husband in a tone of indignant remonstrance. But Edouard, a tight, sleek
+little _épicier_, of about five-and-thirty, had never heard that an oar
+on each side was necessary in a boat, and the harder he pulled the less
+likely was he to regain the shore. Of this he began to be convinced, as
+he whirled more into the centre of the current; and his efforts now
+really became frantic, for his imagination probably painted the horrors
+of a distant voyage in an unknown bark to an unknown land, and all
+without food or compass. The women screamed, and the louder they cried,
+the more strenuously he persevered in saying, "Laisse-moi m'amuser--je
+m'amuse, je m'amuse." By this time the perspiration poured from the face
+of Edouard, and I called to the imperturbable Pierre, who stood in
+silent admiration of his punt while playing such antics, and desired him
+to tell the man to put his oar on the bottom, and to push the boat
+ashore. "Oui, Monsieur," said the rogue, with a leer, for he remembered
+the francs, and we soon had our adventurer safe on _terra firma_ again.
+Then began the tender expostulations, the affectionate reproaches, and
+the kind injunctions for the truant to remember that he was a husband
+and a father. Edouard, secretly cursing the punt and all rivers in his
+heart, made light of the matter, however, protesting to the last that he
+had only been enjoying himself.
+
+We have had a fête too; for every village in the vicinity of Paris has
+its fête. The square was filled with whirligigs and flying-horses, and
+all the ingenious contrivances of the French to make and to spend a sou
+pleasantly. There was service in the parish church, at which our
+neighbours sang in a style fit for St. Peter's, and the villagers danced
+quadrilles on the green with an air that would be thought fine in many a
+country drawing-room.
+
+I enjoy all this greatly; for, to own the truth, the crowds and mannered
+sameness of Paris began to weary me. Our friends occasionally come from
+town to see us, and we make good use of the cabriolet. As we are near
+neighbours to St. Denis, we have paid several visits to the tombs of the
+French kings, and returned each time less pleased with most of the
+unmeaning obsequies that are observed in their vaults. There was a
+ceremony, not long since, at which the royal family and many of the
+great officers of the court assisted, and among others M. de Talleyrand.
+The latter was in the body of the church, when a man rushed upon him and
+actually struck him, or shoved him to the earth, using at the same time
+language that left no doubt of the nature of the assault. There are
+strange rumours connected with the affair. The assailant was a Marquis
+de ----, and it is reported that his wrongs, real or imaginary, are
+connected with a plot to rob one of the dethroned family of her jewels,
+or of some crown jewels, I cannot say which, at the epoch of the
+restoration. The journals said a good deal about it at the time, but
+events occur so fast here that a quarrel of this sort produces little
+sensation. I pretend to no knowledge of the merits of this affair, and
+only give a general outline of what was current in the public prints at
+the time.
+
+We have also visited Enghien, and Montmorency. The latter, as you know
+already, stands on the side of a low mountain, in plain view of Paris.
+It is a town of some size, with very uneven streets, some of them being
+actually sharp acclivities, and a Gothic church that is seen from afar
+and that is well worth viewing near by. These quaint edifices afford us
+deep delight, by their antiquity, architecture, size, and pious
+histories. What matters it to us how much or how little superstition may
+blend with the rites, when we know and feel that we are standing in a
+nave that has echoed with orisons to God, for a thousand years! This of
+Montmorency is not quite so old, however, having been rebuilt only three
+centuries since.
+
+Dulaure, a severe judge of aristocracy, denounces the pretension of the
+Montmorencies to be the _Premiers Barons Chrétiens_, affirming that they
+were neither the first barons, nor the first Christians, by a great
+many. He says, that the extravagant title has most probably been a
+war-cry, in the time of the crusaders. According to his account of the
+family it originated, about the year 1008, in a certain Borchard, who,
+proving a bad neighbour to the Abbey of St. Denis, the vassals of which
+he was in the habit of robbing, besides, now and then, despoiling a
+monk, the king caused his fortress in the Isle St. Denis to be razed;
+after which, by a treaty, he was put in possession of the mountain hard
+by, with permission to erect another hold near a fountain, at a place
+called in the charters, Montmorenciacum. Hence the name, and the family.
+This writer thinks that the first castle must have been built of wood!
+
+We took a road that led us up to a bluff on the mountain, behind the
+town, where we obtained a new and very peculiar view of Paris and its
+environs. I have said that the French towns have no straggling suburbs.
+A few winehouses (to save the _octroi_) are built near the gates,
+compactly, as in the town itself, and there the buildings cease as
+suddenly as if pared down by a knife. The fields touch the walls, in
+many places, and between St. Ouen and the guinguettes and winehouses, at
+the Barrière de Clichy, a distance of two miles, there is but a solitary
+building. A wide plain separates Paris, on this side, from the
+mountains, and of course our view extended across it. The number of
+villages was absolutely astounding. Although I did not attempt counting
+them, I should think not fewer than a hundred were in sight, all grey,
+picturesque, and clustering round the high nave and church tower, like
+chickens gathering beneath the wing. The day was clouded, and the
+hamlets rose from their beds of verdure, sombre but distinct, with their
+faces of wall, now in subdued light, and now quite shaded, resembling
+the glorious _darks_ of Rembrandt's pictures.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XVII.
+
+Rural Drives.--French Peasantry.--View of Montmartre.--The Boulevards.
+--The Abattoirs.--Search for Lodgings.--A queer Breakfast.--Royal
+Progresses and Magnificence.--French Carriages and Horses.--Modes of
+Conveyance.--Drunkenness.--French Criminal Justice.--Marvellous Stories
+of the Police.
+
+
+To CAPT. M. PERRY, U.S.N.
+
+I am often in the saddle since our removal to St. Ouen. I first
+commenced the business of exploring in the cabriolet, with my wife for a
+companion, during which time, several very pretty drives, of whose
+existence one journeying along the great roads would form no idea, were
+discovered. At last, as these became exhausted, I mounted, and pricked
+into the fields. The result has been a better knowledge of the details
+of ordinary rural life, in this country, than a stranger would get by a
+residence, after the ordinary fashion, of years.
+
+I found the vast plain intersected by roads as intricate as the veins of
+the human body. The comparison is not unapt, by the way, and may be even
+carried out much further; for the _grandes routes_ can be compared to
+the arteries, the _chemins vicinaux_, or cross-roads, to the veins, and
+the innumerable paths that intersect the fields, in all directions, to
+the more minute blood-vessels, circulation being the object common to
+all.
+
+I mount my horse and gallop into the fields at random, merely taking
+care not to quit the paths. By the latter, one can go in almost any
+direction; and as they are very winding there is a certain pleasure in
+following their sinuosities, doubtful whither they tend. Much of the
+plain is in vegetables, for the use of Paris; though there is
+occasionally a vineyard, or a field of grain. The weather has become
+settled and autumnal, and is equally without the chilling moisture of
+the winter, or the fickleness of the spring. The kind-hearted peasants
+see me pass among them without distrust, and my salutations are answered
+with cheerfulness and civility. Even at this trifling distance from the
+capital, I miss the brusque ferocity that is so apt to characterise the
+deportment of its lower classes, who are truly the people that Voltaire
+has described as "ou singes, ou tigres." Nothing, I think, strikes an
+American more than the marked difference between the town and country of
+France. With us, the towns are less town-like, and the country less
+country-like, than is usually the case. Our towns are provincial from
+the want of tone that can only be acquired by time, while it is a fault
+with our country to wish to imitate the towns. I now allude to habits
+only, for nature at home, owing to the great abundance of wood, is more
+strikingly rural than in any other country I know. The inhabitant of
+Paris can quit his own door in the centre of the place, and after
+walking an hour he finds himself truly in the country, both as to the
+air of external objects, and as to the manners of the people. The
+influence of the capital doubtless has some little effect on the latter,
+but not enough to raise them above the ordinary rusticity, for the
+French peasants are as rustic in their appearance and habits as the
+upper classes are refined.
+
+One of my rides is through the plain that lies between St. Ouen and
+Montmartre, ascending the latter by its rear to the windmills that,
+night and day, are whirling their ragged arms over the capital of
+France. Thence I descend into the town by the carriage road. A view from
+this height is like a glimpse into the pages of history; for every foot
+of land that it commands, and more than half the artificial accessories,
+are pregnant of the past. Looking down into the fissures between the
+houses, men appear the mites they are; and one gets to have a
+philosophical indifference to human vanities by obtaining these
+bird's-eye views of them in the mass. It was a happy thought that first
+suggested the summits of mountains for religious contemplation; nor do I
+think the father of evil discovered his usual sagacity when he resorted
+to such a place for the purposes of selfish temptation: perhaps,
+however, it would be better to say, he betrayed the grovelling
+propensities of his own nature. The cathedral of Notre Dame should have
+been reared on this noble and isolated height, that the airs of heaven
+might whisper through its fane, breathing the chaunts in honour of God.
+
+Dismounting manfully, I have lately undertaken a far more serious
+enterprise--that of making the entire circuit of Paris on foot. My
+companion was our old friend Captain ----. We met by appointment at
+eleven o'clock, just without the Barrière de Clichy, and ordering the
+carriage to come for us at five, off we started, taking the direction of
+the eastern side of the town. You probably know that what are commonly
+called the _boulevards_ of Paris, are no more than a circular line of
+wide streets through the very heart of the place, which obtain their
+common appellation from the fact that they occupy the sites of the
+ancient walls. Thus the street within this circuit is called by its
+name, whatever it may happen to be, and if continued without the
+circuit, the term of _faubourg_ or suburb is added; as in the case of
+the Rue St. Honoré and the Rue du Faubourg St. Honoré, the latter being
+strictly a continuation of the former, but lying without the site of the
+ancient walls. As the town has increased, it has been found necessary to
+enlarge its _enceinte_, and the walls are now encircled with wide
+avenues that are called the outer _boulevards_. There are avenues within
+and without the walls, and immediately beneath them; and in many places
+both are planted. Our route was on the exterior.
+
+We began the march in good spirits, and by twelve we had handsomely done
+our four miles and a half. Of course we passed the different
+_barrières_, and the gate of Père Lachaise. The captain commenced with
+great vigour, and for near two hours, as he expressed himself, he had me
+a little on his lee quarter; not more, however, he thought, than was due
+to his superior rank, for he had once been my senior as a midshipman. At
+the Barrière du Trône we were compelled to diverge a little from the
+wall, in order to get across the river by the Pont d'Austerlitz. By this
+time I had ranged up abeam of the commodore, and I proposed that we
+should follow the river up as far as the wall again, in order to do our
+work honestly; but to this he objected that he had no wish to puzzle
+himself with spherical trigonometry; that plane sailing was his humour
+at the moment; and that he had, moreover, just discovered that one of
+his boots pinched his foot. Accordingly we proceeded straight from the
+bridge, not meeting the wall again until we were beyond the _abattoir_.
+These _abattoirs_ are slaughter-houses, that Napoleon caused to be built
+near the walls, in some places within, and in others without them,
+according to the different localities. There are five or six of them,
+that of Montmartre being the most considerable. They are kept in
+excellent order, and the regulations respecting them appear to be
+generally good. The butchers sell their meats, in shops, all over the
+town, a general custom in Europe, and one that has more advantages than
+disadvantages, as it enables the inhabitant to order a meal at any
+moment. This independence in the mode of living distinguishes all the
+large towns of this part of the world from our own; for I greatly
+question if there be any civilized people among whom the individual is
+as much obliged to consult the habits and tastes of _all_, in gratifying
+his own, as in free and independent America. A part of this
+uncomfortable feature in our domestic economy is no doubt the result of
+circumstances unavoidably connected with the condition of a young
+country; but a great deal is to be ascribed to the practice of referring
+everything to the public, and not a little to those religious sects who
+extended their supervision to all the affairs of life, that had a chief
+concern in settling the country, and who have entailed so much that is
+inconvenient and ungraceful (I might almost say, in some instances,
+_disgraceful_) on the nation, blended with so much that forms its purest
+sources of pride. Men are always an inconsistent medley of good and bad.
+
+The captain and myself had visited the _abattoir_ of Montmartre only a
+few days previously to this excursion, and we had both been much
+gratified with its order and neatness. But an unfortunate pile of hocks,
+hoofs, tallow, and nameless fragments of carcasses, had caught my
+companion's eye. I found him musing over this _omnium gatherum_, which
+he protested was worse than a bread-pudding at Saratoga. By some process
+of reasoning that was rather material than philosophical, he came to the
+conclusion that the substratum of all the extraordinary compounds he had
+met with at the _restaurans_ was derived from this pile, and he swore as
+terribly as any of "our army in Flanders," that not another mouthful
+would he touch, while he remained in Paris, if the dish put his
+knowledge of natural history at fault. He had all along suspected he had
+been eating cats and vermin, but his imagination had never pictured to
+him such a store of abominations for the _casserole_ as were to be seen
+in this pile. In vain I asked him if he did not find the dishes good.
+Cats might be good for anything he knew, but he was too old to change
+his habits. On the present occasion, he made the situation of the
+Abattoir d'Ivry an excuse for not turning up the river by the wall. I do
+not think, however, we gained anything in the distance, the _détour_ to
+cross the bridge more than equalling the ground we missed.
+
+We came under the wall again at the Barrière de Ville Juif, and followed
+it, keeping on the side next the town until we fairly reached the river
+once more, beyond Vaugirard. Here we were compelled to walk some
+distance to cross the Pont de Jena, and again to make a considerable
+circuit through Passy, on account of the gardens, in order to do justice
+to our task. About this time the commodore fairly fell astern; and he
+discovered that the other boot was too large. I kept talking to him over
+my shoulder, and cheering him on, and he felicitated me on frogs
+agreeing so well with my constitution. At length we came in at the
+Barrière de Clichy, just as the clocks struck three, or in four hours,
+to a minute, from the time we had left the same spot. We had neither
+stopped, eaten, nor drunk a mouthful. The distance is supposed to be
+about eighteen miles, but I can hardly think it is so much, for we went
+rather further than if we had closely followed the wall.
+
+Our agility having greatly exceeded my calculations, we were obliged to
+walk two miles further, in order to find the carriage. The time expended
+in going this distance included, we were just four hours and a half on
+our feet. The captain protested that his boots had disgraced him, and
+forthwith commanded another pair; a subterfuge that did him no good.
+
+One anecdote connected with the sojourn of this eccentric, but really
+excellent-hearted and intelligent man,[22] at Paris is too good not to be
+told. He cannot speak a word of pure French; and of all Anglicizing of
+the language I have ever heard, his attempts at it are the most droll.
+He calls the Tuileries, Tully_rees_; the Jardin des Plantes, the _Garden
+dis Plants_; the guillotine, gully_teen_; and the _garçons_ of the
+_cafés_, _gassons_. Choleric, with whiskers like a bear, and a voice of
+thunder, if anything goes wrong, he swears away, starboard and larboard,
+in French and English, in delightful discord.
+
+[Footnote 22: He is since dead.]
+
+He sought me out soon after his arrival, and carried me with him, as an
+interpreter, in quest of lodgings. We found a very snug little apartment
+of four rooms, that he took. The last occupant was a lady, who, in
+letting the rooms, conditioned that Marie, her servant, must be hired
+with them, to look after the furniture, and to be in readiness to
+receive her at her return from the provinces. A few days after this
+arrangement I called, and was surprised, on ringing the bell, to hear
+the cry of an infant. After a moment's delay the door was cautiously
+opened, and the captain, in his gruffest tone, demanded, "Cur vully
+voo?" An exclamation of surprise at seeing me followed; but instead of
+opening the door for my admission, he held it for a moment, as if
+undecided whether to be "at home" or not. At this critical instant an
+infant cried again, and the thing became too ridiculous for further
+gravity. We both laughed outright. I entered, and found the captain with
+a child three days old tucked under his right arm, or that which had
+been concealed by the door. The explanation was very simple, and
+infinitely to his credit.
+
+Marie, the _locum tenens_ of the lady who had let the apartment, and the
+wife of a coachman who was in the country, was the mother of the infant.
+After its birth she presented herself to her new master; told her story;
+adding, by means of an interpreter, that if he turned her away, she had
+no place in which to lay her head. The kind-hearted fellow made out to
+live abroad as well as he could for a day or two--an easy thing enough
+in Paris, by the way,--and when I so unexpectedly entered, Marie was
+actually cooking the captain's breakfast in the kitchen while he was
+nursing the child in the _salon!_
+
+The dialogues between the captain and Marie were to the last degree
+amusing. He was quite unconscious of the odd sounds he uttered in
+speaking French, but thought he was getting on very well, being rather
+minute and particular in his orders; and she felt his kindness to
+herself and child so sensibly, that she always fancied she understood
+his wishes. I was frequently compelled to interpret between them; first
+asking him to explain himself in English, for I could make but little of
+his French myself. On one occasion he invited me to breakfast, as we
+were to pass the day exploring in company. By way of inducement, he told
+me that he had accidentally found some cocoa in the shell, and that he
+had been teaching Marie how to cook it "ship-fashion." I would not
+promise, as his hour was rather early, and the distance between us so
+great; but before eleven I would certainly be with him. I breakfasted at
+home therefore, but was punctual to the latter engagement. "I hope you
+have breakfasted?" cried the captain, rather fiercely, as I entered. I
+satisfied him on this point; and then, after a minute of demure
+reflection, he resumed, "You are lucky; for Marie boiled the cocoa, and,
+after throwing away the liquor, she buttered and peppered the shells,
+and served them for me to eat! I don't see how she made such a mistake,
+for I was very particular in my directions, and be d----d to her! I
+don't care so much about my own breakfast neither, for that can be had
+at the next _café_; but the poor creature has lost hers, which I told
+her to cook out of the rest of the cocoa." I had the curiosity to
+inquire how he had made out to tell Marie to do all this. "Why, I showed
+her the cocoa, to be sure, and then told her to _boily vous-même_."
+There was no laughing at this, and so I went with the captain to a
+_café_; after which we proceeded in quest of the _gullyteen_, which he
+was particularly anxious to see.
+
+My rides often extend to the heights behind Malmaison and St. Cloud,
+where there is a fine country, and where some of the best views in the
+vicinity of Paris are to be obtained. As the court is at St. Cloud, I
+often meet different members of the royal family dashing to or from
+town, or perhaps passing from one of their abodes to another. The style
+is pretty uniform, for I do not remember to have ever met the king but
+once with less than eight horses. The exception was quite early one
+morning, when he was going into the country with very little _éclat_,
+accompanied by the Dauphine. Even on this occasion he was in a carriage
+and six, followed by another with four, and attended by a dozen mounted
+men. These royal progresses are truly magnificent; and they serve
+greatly to enliven the road, as we live so near the country palace. The
+king has been quite lately to a camp formed at St. Omer, and I happened
+to meet a portion of his equipages on their return. The carriages I saw
+were very neatly built post-chaises, well leathered, and contained what
+are here called the "officers of the mouth," alias "cooks and
+purveyors." They were all drawn by four horses. This was a great
+occasion--furniture being actually sent from the palace of Compiègne for
+the king's lodgings, and the court is said to have employed seventy
+different vehicles to transport it. I saw about a dozen.
+
+Returning the other night from a dinner-party, given on the banks of the
+Seine, a few miles above us, I saw flaring lights gleaming along the
+highway, which, at first, caused nearly as much conjecture as some of
+the adventures of Don Quixotte. My horse proving a little restive, I
+pulled up, placing the cabriolet on one side of the road, for the first
+impression was that the cattle employed at some funeral procession had
+taken flight and were running away. It proved to be the Dauphine dashing
+towards St. Cloud. This was the first time I had ever met any of the
+royal equipages at night, and the passage was much the most picturesque
+of any I had hitherto seen. Footmen, holding flaming flambeaux, rode in
+pairs in front, by the side of the carriage, and in its rear; the
+_piqueur_ scouring along the road in advance, like a rocket. By the way,
+a lady of the court told me lately that Louis XVIII. had lost some of
+his French by the emigration, for he did not know how to pronounce this
+word _piqueur_.
+
+On witnessing all this magnificence, the mind is carried back a few
+generations, in the inquiry after the progress of luxury, and the usages
+of our fathers. Coaches were first used in England in the reign of
+Elizabeth. It is clear enough, by the pictures in the Louvre, that in
+the time of Louis XIV. the royal carriages were huge, clumsy vehicles,
+with at least three seats. Mademoiselle de Montpensier, in her Memoirs,
+tells us how often she took her place at the window, in order to admire
+the graceful attitudes of M. de Lauzun, who rode near it. There is still
+in existence, in the Bibliothèque du Roi, a letter of Henry IV. to
+Sully, in which the king explains to the grand master the reason why he
+could not come to the arsenal that day; the excuse being that the queen
+_was using the carriage!_ To-day his descendant seldom moves at a pace
+slower than ten miles the hour, is drawn by eight horses, and is usually
+accompanied by one or more empty vehicles of equal magnificence to
+receive him, in the event of an accident.
+
+Notwithstanding all this regal splendour, the turn-outs of Paris, as a
+whole, are by no means remarkable. The genteelest and the fashionable
+carriage is the chariot. I like the proportions of the French carriages
+better than those of the English or our own, the first being too heavy,
+and the last too light. The French vehicles appear to me to be in this
+respect a happy medium. But the finish is by no means equal to that of
+the English carriages, nor at all better than that of ours. There are
+relatively a large proportion of shabby-genteel equipages at Paris. Even
+the vehicles that are seen standing in the court of the Tuileries on a
+reception day are not at all superior to the better sort of American
+carriages, though the liveries are much more showy.
+
+Few people here own the carriages and horses they use. Even the
+strangers, who are obliged to have travelling vehicles rarely use them
+in town, the road and the streets requiring very different sorts of
+equipages. There are certain job-dealers who furnish all that is
+required for a stipulated sum. You select the carriage and horses on
+trial and contract at so much a month, or at so much a year. The
+coachman usually comes with the equipage, as does the footman sometimes,
+though both are paid by the person taking the coach. They will wear your
+livery, if you choose, and you can have your arms put on the carriage if
+desirable. I pay five hundred francs a month for a carriage and horses,
+and forty francs for a coachman. I believe this is the usual price. I
+have a right to have a pair of horses always at my command, finding
+nothing but the stable, and even this would be unnecessary in Paris. If
+we go away from our own stable, I pay five francs a day extra. There is
+a very great convenience to strangers, in particular, in this system,
+for one can set up and lay down a carriage, without unnecessary trouble
+or expense, as it may be wanted. In everything of this nature, we have
+no town that has the least character, or the conveniences, of a capital.
+
+The French have little to boast of in the way of horseflesh. Most of the
+fine coach and cabriolet cattle of Paris come from Mecklenburgh, though
+some are imported from England. It is not common to meet with a very
+fine animal of the native breed. In America, land is so plenty and so
+cheap, that we keep a much larger proportion of brute force than is kept
+here. It is not uncommon with us to meet with those who live by day's
+work, using either oxen or horses. The consequence is that many beasts
+are raised with little care, and with scarcely any attention to the
+breeds. We find many good ones. In spite of bad grooming, little
+training, and hard work, I greatly question if even England possesses a
+larger proportion of good horses, comparing the population of the two
+countries, than America. Our animals are quicker footed, and at
+trotting, I suspect, we could beat the world; Christendom, certainly.
+The great avenue between the garden of the Tuileries and the Bois de
+Boulogne, with the _allées_ of the latter, are the places to meet the
+fast-goers of the French capital, and I am strongly of opinion that
+there is no such exhibition of speed, in either, as one meets on the
+Third Avenue of New York. As for the Avenue de Neuilly, our sulky riders
+would vanish like the wind from anything I have seen on it; although one
+meets there, occasionally, fine animals from all parts of Europe.
+
+The cattle of the _diligences_, of the post-houses, and even of the
+cavalry of France, are solid, hardy and good feeders, but they are
+almost entirely without speed or action. The two former are very much
+the same, and it is a hard matter to get more than eight miles out of
+them without breaking into a gallop, or more than ten, if put under the
+whip. Now, a short time previously to leaving home, I went eleven
+measured miles, in a public coach, in two minutes less than an hour, the
+whip untouched. I sat on the box, by the side of the driver, and know
+that this was done under a pull that actually disabled one of his arms,
+and that neither of the four animals broke its trot. It is not often our
+roads will admit of this, but, had we the roads of England, I make
+little doubt we should altogether outdo her in speed. As for the horses
+used here in the public conveyances, and for the post routes, they are
+commonly compact, clumsy beasts, with less force than their shape would
+give reason to suppose. Their manes are long and shaggy, the fetlocks
+are rarely trimmed, the shoes are seldom corked, and, when there is a
+little coquetry, the tail is braided. In this trim, with a coarse
+harness, that is hardly ever cleaned, traces of common rope, and half
+the time no blinkers or reins, away they scamper, with their heads in
+all directions, like the classical representation of a team in an
+ancient car, through thick and thin, working with all their might to do
+two posts within an hour, one being the legal measure. These animals
+appear to possess a strange _bonhomie_, being obedient, willing and
+tractable, although, in the way of harness and reins, they are pretty
+much their own masters.
+
+My excursions in the environs have made me acquainted with a great
+variety of modes of communication between the capital and its adjacent,
+villages. Although Paris is pared down so accurately, and is almost
+without suburbs, the population, within a circuit of ten miles in each
+direction, is almost equal to that of Paris itself. St. Denis has
+several thousands, St. Germain the same, and Versailles is still a town
+of considerable importance. All these places, with villages out of
+number, keep up daily intercourse with the city, and in addition to the
+hundreds of vegetable carts that constantly pass to and fro, there are
+many conveyances that are exclusively devoted to passengers. The
+cheapest and lowest is called a _coucou_ for no reason that I can see,
+unless it be that a man looks very like a fool to have a seat in one of
+them. They are large cabriolets, with two and even three seats. The
+wheels are enormous, and there is commonly a small horse harnessed by
+the side of a larger, in the hills, to drag perhaps eight or nine
+people. One is amazed to see the living carrion that is driven about a
+place like Paris, in these uncouth vehicles. The river is so exceedingly
+crooked, that it is little used by travellers above Rouen.
+
+The internal transportation of France, where the lines of the rivers are
+not followed, is carried on, almost exclusively, in enormous carts,
+drawn by six and even eight heavy horses, harnessed in a line. The
+burthen is often as large as a load of hay, not quite so high, perhaps,
+but generally longer, care being had to preserve the balance in such a
+manner as to leave no great weight on the shaft horse. These teams are
+managed with great dexterity, and I have often stopped and witnessed,
+with admiration, the entrance of one of them into a yard, as it passed
+from a crowded street probably not more than thirty feet wide. But the
+evolutions of the _diligence_, guided as it chiefly is by the whip, and
+moving on a trot, are really nice affairs. I came from La Grange, some
+time since, in one, and I thought that we should dash everything to
+pieces in the streets, and yet nothing was injured. At the close of the
+journey, our team of five horses, two on the pole and three on the lead,
+wheeled, without breaking its trot, into a street that was barely wide
+enough to receive the huge vehicle, and this too without human
+direction, the driver being much too drunk to be of any service. These
+_diligences_ are uncouth objects to the eye; but, for the inside
+passengers, they are much more comfortable, so far as my experience
+extends than either the American stage or the English coach.
+
+The necessity of passing the _barrière_ two or three times a day, has
+also made me acquainted with the great amount of drunkenness that
+prevails in Paris. Wine can be had outside of the walls, for about half
+the price which is paid for it within the town, as it escapes the
+_octroi_, or city duty. The people resort to these places for
+indulgence, and there is quite as much low blackguardism and guzzling
+here, as is to be met with in any sea-port I know.
+
+Provisions of all sorts, too, are cheaper without the gates, for the
+same reason; and the lower classes resort to them to celebrate their
+weddings, and on other eating and drinking occasions. "Ici on fait
+festins et noces,"[23] is a common sign, no barrier being without more or
+less of these houses. The _guinguettes_ are low gardens, answering to
+the English tea-gardens of the humblest class, with a difference in the
+drinkables and other fare. The base of Montmartre is crowded with them.
+
+[Footnote 23: Weddings and merry-makings are kept here.]
+
+One sometimes meets with an unpleasant adventure among these exhilarated
+gentry; for, though I think a low Frenchman is usually better natured
+when a little _grisé_ than when perfectly sober, this is not always the
+case. Quite lately I had an affair that might have terminated seriously,
+but for our good luck. It is usual to have two sets of reins to the
+cabriolets, the horses being very spirited, and the danger from
+accidents in streets so narrow and crowded being great. I had dined in
+town, and was coming out about nine o'clock. The horse was walking up
+the ascent to the Barrière de Clichy, when I observed, by the shadow
+cast from a bright moon, that there was a man seated on the cabriolet,
+behind. Charles was driving, and I ordered him to tell the man to get
+off. Finding words of no effect, Charles gave him a slight tap with his
+whip. The fellow instantly sprang forward, seized the horse by the
+reins, and attempted to drag him to one side of the road. Failing in
+this, he fled up the street. Charles now called out that he had cut the
+reins. I seized the other pair and brought the horse up, and, as soon as
+he was under command, we pursued our assailant at a gallop. He was soon
+out of breath, and we captured him. As I felt very indignant at the
+supposed outrage, which might have cost, not us only, but others, their
+lives, I gave him in charge to two gendarmes at the gate, with my
+address, promising to call at the police office in the morning.
+
+Accordingly, next day I presented myself, and was surprised to find that
+the man had been liberated. I had discovered, in the interval, that the
+leather had broken, and had not been cut, which materially altered the
+_animus_ of the offence, and I had come with an intention to ask for the
+release of the culprit, believing it merely a sally of temper, which a
+night's imprisonment sufficiently punished; but the man being _charged_
+with cutting the rein, I thought the magistrate had greatly forgotten
+himself in discharging him before I appeared. Indeed I made no scruple
+in telling him so. We had some warm words, and parted. I make no doubt I
+was mistaken for an Englishman, and that the old national antipathy was
+at work against me.
+
+I was a good deal surprised at the termination of this, my first essay
+in French criminal justice. So many eulogiums have been passed on the
+police, that I was not prepared to find this indifference to an offence
+like that of wantonly cutting the reins of a spirited cabriolet horse,
+in the streets of Paris; for such was the charge on which the man stood
+committed. I mentioned the affair to a friend, and he said that the
+police was good only for political offences, and that the government
+rather leaned to the side of the rabble, in order to find support with
+them, in the event of any serious movement. This, you will remember, was
+the opinion of a Frenchman, and not mine; for I only relate the facts
+(one conjecture excepted), and to do justice to all parties, it is
+proper to add that my friend is warmly opposed to the present _régime_.
+
+I have uniformly found the gendarmes civil, and even obliging; and I
+have seen them show great forbearance on various occasions. As to the
+marvellous stories we have heard of the police of Paris, I suspect they
+have been gotten up for effect, such things being constantly practised
+here. One needs be behind the curtain, in a great many things, to get a
+just idea of the true state of the world. A laughable instance has just
+occurred, within my knowledge, of a story that has been got up for
+effect. The town was quite horrified lately, with an account, in the
+journals, of a careless nurse permitting a child to fall into the
+_fossé_ of the great bears, in the Jardin des Plantes, and of the bears
+eating up the dear little thing, to the smallest fragment, before
+succour could be obtained. Happening to be at the garden soon after, in
+the company of one connected with the establishment, I inquired into the
+circumstances, and was told that the nurses were very careless with the
+children, and that the story was published in order that the bears
+should not eat up any child hereafter, rather than because they had
+eaten up a child heretofore!
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XVIII.
+
+Personal Intercourse.--Parisian Society and Hospitality.--Influence of
+Money.--Fiacres.--M. de Lameth.--Strife of Courtesy.--Standard of
+Delicacy.--French Dinners.--Mode of Visiting.--The Chancellor of
+France.--The Marquis de Marbois.--Political Côteries.--Paris Lodgings.
+--A French Party.--An English Party.--A splendid Ball.--Effects of good
+Breeding.--Characteristic Traits.--Influence of a Court.
+
+
+To MRS. POMEROY, COOPERSTOWN.
+
+I have said very little, in my previous letters, on the subject of our
+personal intercourse with the society of Paris. It is not always easy
+for one to be particular in these matters, and maintain the reserve that
+is due to others. Violating the confidence he may have received through
+his hospitality, is but an indifferent return from the guest to the
+host. Still there are men, if I may so express it, so public in their
+very essence, certainly in their lives, that propriety is less concerned
+with a repetition of their sentiments, and with delineations of their
+characters, than in ordinary cases; for the practice of the world has
+put them so much on their guard against the representations of
+travellers, that there is more danger of rendering a false account, by
+becoming their dupes, than of betraying them in their unguarded moments.
+I have scarcely ever been admitted to the presence of a real notoriety,
+that I did not find the man, or woman--sex making little difference--an
+actor; and this, too, much beyond the everyday and perhaps justifiable
+little practices of conventional life. Inherent simplicity of character
+is one of the rarest, as, tempered by the tone imparted by refinement,
+it is the loveliest of all our traits, though it is quite common to meet
+with those who affect it, with an address that is very apt to deceive
+the ordinary, and most especially the flattered, observer.
+
+Opportunity, rather than talents, is the great requisite for circulating
+gossip; a very moderate degree of ability sufficing for the observation
+which shall render private anecdotes, more especially when they relate
+to persons of celebrity, of interest to the general reader. But there is
+another objection to being merely the medium of information of this low
+quality, that I should think would have great influence with every one
+who has the common self-respect of a gentleman. _There is a tacit
+admission of inferiority_ in the occupation, that ought to prove too
+humiliating to a man accustomed to those associations, which imply
+equality. It is permitted to touch upon the habits and appearance of a
+truly great man; but to dwell upon the peculiarities of a duke, merely
+because he is a duke, is as much as to say he is your superior; a
+concession, I do not feel disposed to make in favour of any _mere duke_
+in Christendom.
+
+I shall not, however, be wholly silent on the general impressions left
+by the little I have seen of the society of Paris; and, occasionally,
+when it is characteristic, an anecdote may be introduced, for such
+things sometimes give distinctness, as well as piquancy, to a
+description.
+
+During our first winter in Paris, our circle, never very large, was
+principally confined to foreign families intermingled with a few French;
+but since our return to town, from St. Ouen, we have seen more of the
+people of the country. I should greatly mislead you, however, were I to
+leave the impression that our currency in the French capital has been at
+all general, for it certainly has not. Neither my health, leisure,
+fortune, nor opportunities, have permitted this. I believe few, perhaps
+no Americans, have very general access to the best society of any large
+European town; at all events, I have met with no one who I have had any
+reason to think was much better off than myself in this respect; and, I
+repeat, my own familiarity with the circles of the capital is nothing to
+boast of. It is in Paris, as it is everywhere else, as respects those
+who are easy of access. In all large towns there is to be found a
+troublesome and pushing set, who, requiring notoriety, obtrude
+themselves on strangers, sometimes with sounding names, and always with
+offensive pretensions of some sort or other; but the truly respectable
+and estimable class, in every country, except in cases that cannot
+properly be included in the rule, are to be sought. Now, one must feel
+that he has peculiar claims, or be better furnished with letters than
+happened to be my case, to get a ready admission into this set, or,
+having obtained it, to feel that his position enabled him to maintain
+the intercourse, with the ease and freedom that could alone render it
+agreeable. To be shown about as a lion, when circumstances offer the
+means; to be stuck up at a dinner-table, as a piece of luxury, like
+strawberries in February, or peaches in April,--can hardly be called
+association: the terms being much on a par with that which forms the
+_liaisons_, between him who gives the entertainment, and the hired plate
+with which his table is garnished. With this explanation, then, you are
+welcome to an outline of the little I know on the subject.
+
+One of the errors respecting the French, which has been imported into
+America, through England, is the impression that they are not
+hospitable. Since my residence here, I have often been at a loss to
+imagine how such a notion could have arisen, for I am acquainted with no
+town, in which it has struck me there is more true hospitality than in
+Paris. Not only are dinners, balls, and all the minor entertainments
+frequent, but there is scarcely a man, or a woman, of any note in
+society, who does not cause his or her doors to be opened, once a
+fortnight at least, and, in half the cases, once a week. At these
+_soirées_ invitations are sometimes given, it is true, but then they are
+general, and for the whole season; and it is not unusual, even, to
+consider them free to all who are on visiting terms with the family. The
+utmost simplicity and good taste prevail at these places, the
+refreshments being light and appropriate, and the forms exacting no more
+than what belongs to good breeding. You will, at once, conceive the
+great advantages that a stranger possesses in having access to such
+social resources. One, with a tolerable visiting list, may choose his
+circle for any particular evening, and if, by chance, the company should
+not happen to be to his mind, he has still before him the alternative of
+several other houses, which are certain to be open. It is not easy to
+say what can be more truly hospitable than this.
+
+The _petits soupers_, once so celebrated, are entirely superseded by the
+new distribution of time, which is probably the most rational that can
+be devised for a town life. The dinner is at six, an hour that is too
+early to interfere with the engagements of the evening, it being usually
+over at eight, and too late to render food again necessary that night;
+an arrangement that greatly facilitates the evening intercourse,
+releasing it at once from all trouble and parade.
+
+It has often been said in favour of French society, that once within the
+doors of a _salon_, all are equal. This is not literally so, it being
+impossible that such a state of things can exist; nor is it desirable
+that it should, since it is confounding all sentiment and feeling,
+overlooking the claims of age, services, merit of every sort, and
+setting at nought the whole construction of society. It is not
+absolutely true that even rank is entirely forgotten in French society,
+though I think it sufficiently so to prevent any deference to it from
+being offensive. The social pretensions of a French peer are exceedingly
+well regulated, nor do I remember to have seen an instance in which a
+very young man has been particularly noticed on account of his having
+claims of this sort. Distinguished men are so very numerous in Paris,
+that they excite no great feeling, and the even course of society is
+little disturbed on their account.
+
+Although all within the doors of a French _salon_ are not perfectly
+equal, none are made unpleasantly to feel the indifference. I dare say
+there are circles in Paris, in which the mere possession of money may be
+a source of evident distinction, but it must be in a very inferior set.
+The French, while they are singularly alive to the advantages of money,
+and extremely liable to yield to its influence in all important matters,
+rarely permit any manifestations of its power to escape them in their
+ordinary intercourse. As a people, they appear to me to be ready to
+yield everything to money but its external homage. On these points they
+are the very converse of the Americans, who are hard to be bought, while
+they consider money the very base of all distinction. The origin of
+these peculiarities may be found in the respective conditions of the two
+countries.
+
+In America, fortunes are easily and rapidly acquired; pressure reduces
+few to want; he who serves is, if anything, more in demand than he who
+is to be served; and the want of temptation produces exemption from the
+liability to corruption. Men will, and do, daily _corrupt themselves_ in
+the rapacious pursuit of gain, but comparatively few are in the market
+to be bought and sold by others. Notwithstanding this, money being every
+man's goal, there is a secret, profound, and general deference for it,
+while money will do less than in almost any other country in
+Christendom. Here, few young men look forward to gaining distinction by
+making money; they search for it as a means, whereas with us it is the
+end. We have little need of arms in America, and the profession is in
+less request than that of law or merchandize. Of the arts and letters
+the country possesses none, or next to none; and there is no true
+sympathy with either. The only career that is felt as likely to lead,
+and which can lead, to distinction independently of money, is that of
+politics, and, as a whole, this is so much occupied by sheer
+adventurers, with little or no pretentions to the name of statesmen,
+that it is scarcely reputable to belong to it. Although money has no
+influence in politics, or as little as well may be, even the successful
+politician is but a secondary man in ordinary society in comparison with
+the _millionnaire_. Now all this is very much reversed in Paris: money
+does much, while it seems to do but little. The writer of a successful
+comedy would be a much more important personage in the _côteries_ of
+Paris than M. Rothschild; and the inventor of a new bonnet would enjoy
+much more _éclat_ than the inventor of a clever speculation. I question
+if there be a community on earth in which gambling risks in the funds,
+for instance, are more general than in this, and yet the subject appears
+to be entirely lost sight of out of the Bourse.
+
+The little social notoriety that is attached to military distinction
+here has greatly surprised me. It really seems as if France has had so
+much military renown as to be satiated with it. One is elbowed
+constantly by generals, who have gained this or that victory, and yet no
+one seems to care anything about them. I do not mean that the nation is
+indifferent to military glory, but society appears to care little or
+nothing about it. I have seen a good deal of fuss made with the writer
+of a few clever verses, but I have never seen any made with a hero.
+Perhaps it was because the verses were new, and the victories old.
+
+The perfect good taste and indifference which the French manifest
+concerning the private affairs, and concerning the mode of living, of
+one who is admitted to the _salons_, has justly extorted admiration,
+even from the English, the people of all others who most submit to a
+contrary feeling. A hackney-coach is not always admitted into a
+court-yard, but both men and women make their visits in them, without
+any apparent hesitation. No one seems ashamed of confessing poverty. I
+do not say that women of quality often use _fiacres_ to make their
+visits, but men do, and I have seen women in them openly whom I have met
+in some of the best houses in Paris. It is better to go in a private
+carriage, or in a _remise_, if one can, but few hesitate, when their
+means are limited, about using the former. In order to appreciate this
+self-denial, or simplicity, or good sense, it is necessary to remember
+that a Paris _fiacre_ is not to be confounded with any other vehicle on
+earth. I witnessed, a short time since, a ludicrous instance of the
+different degrees of feeling that exist on this point among different
+people. A---- and myself went to the house of an English woman our
+acquaintance who is not very choice in her French. A Mrs. ----, the wife
+of a colonel in the English army, sat next A----, as a French lady
+begged that her carriage might be ordered. Our hostess told her servant
+to order the _fiacre_ of Madame ----. Now Madame ---- kept her chariot,
+to my certain knowledge, but she disregarded the mistake. A---- soon
+after desired that our carriage might come next. The good woman of the
+house, who loved to be busy, again called for the _fiacre_ of Madame
+----. I saw the foot of A---- in motion, but catching my eye, she
+smiled, and the thing passed off. The "voiture de Madame ----," or our
+own carriage, was announced just as Mrs. ---- was trying to make a
+servant understand she wished for hers. "Le fiacre de Madame ----,"
+again put in the bustling hostess. This was too much for a colonel's
+lady, and, with a very pretty air of distress, she took care to explain,
+in a way that all might hear her, that it was a _remise_.
+
+I dare say, vulgar prejudices influence vulgar minds, here, as
+elsewhere, and yet I must say, that I never knew any one hesitate about
+giving an address on account of the humility of the lodgings. It is to
+be presumed that the manner in which families that are historical, and
+of long-established rank, were broken down by the revolution, has had an
+influence in effecting this healthful state of feeling.
+
+The great tact and careful training of the women, serve to add very much
+to the grace of French society. They effectually prevent all
+embarrassments from the question of precedency, by their own decisions.
+Indeed, it appears to be admitted, that when there is any doubt on these
+points, the mistress of the house shall settle it in her own way. I
+found myself lately, at a small dinner, the only stranger, and the
+especially invited guest, standing near Madame la Marquise at the moment
+the service was announced. A bishop made one of the trio. I could not
+precede a man of his years and profession, and he was too polite to
+precede a stranger. It was a nice point. Had it been a question between
+a duke and myself, as a stranger, and under the circumstances of the
+invitation, I should have had the _pas_, but even the lady hesitated
+about discrediting a father of the church. She delayed but an instant,
+and, smiling, she begged us to follow her to the table, avoiding the
+decision altogether. In America such a thing could not have happened,
+for no woman, by a fiction of society, is supposed to know how to walk
+in company without support; but, here, a woman will not spoil her
+curtsey, on entering a room, by leaning on an arm, if she can well help
+it. The practice of tucking up a brace of females (liver and gizzard, as
+the English coarsely, but not inaptly, term it), under one's arms, in
+order to enter a small room that is crowded in a way to render the
+movements of even one person difficult, does not prevail here, it being
+rightly judged that a proper _tenue_, a good walk, and a graceful
+movement, are all impaired by it. This habit also singularly contributes
+to the comfort of your sex, by rendering them more independent of ours.
+No one thinks, except in very particular cases, of going to the door to
+see a lady into her carriage, a custom too provincial to prevail in a
+capital, anywhere. Still, there is an amusing assiduity among the men,
+on certain points of etiquette, that has sometimes made me laugh;
+though, in truth, every concession to politeness being a tribute to
+benevolence, is respectable, unless spoiled in the manner. As we are
+gossiping about trifles, I will mention a usage or two, that to you will
+at least be novel.
+
+I was honoured with a letter from le Chevalier Alexandre de Lameth,[24]
+accompanied by an offering of a book, and I took an early opportunity to
+pay my respects to him. I found this gentleman, who once played so
+conspicuous a part in the politics of France, and who is now a liberal
+deputy, at breakfast, in a small cabinet, at the end of a suite of four
+rooms. He received me politely, conversed a good deal of America, in
+which country he had served as a colonel, under Rochambeau, and I took
+my leave. That M. de Lameth should rise, and even see me into the next
+room, was what every one would expect, and there I again took my leave
+of him. But he followed me to each door, in succession, and when, with a
+little gentle violence, I succeeded in shutting him in the ante-chamber,
+he seemed to yield to my entreaties not to give himself any further
+trouble. I was on the landing, on my way down, when, hearing the door of
+M. de Lameth's apartment open, I turned and saw its master standing
+before it, to give and receive the last bow. Although this extreme
+attention to the feelings of others, and delicacy of demeanour, rather
+marks the Frenchman of the old school, perhaps, it is by no means
+uncommon here. General Lafayette, while he permits me to see him with
+very little ceremony, scarcely ever suffers me to leave him without
+going with me as far as two or three doors. This, in my case, he does
+more from habit than anything else, for he frequently does not even rise
+when I enter; and, sometimes, when I laughingly venture to say so much
+ceremony is scarcely necessary between us, he will take me at my word,
+and go back to his writing, with perfect simplicity.
+
+[Footnote 24: Since dead.]
+
+The reception between the women, I see plainly, is graduated with an
+unpretending but nice regard to their respective claims. They rise, even
+to men, a much more becoming and graceful habit than that of America,
+except in evening circles, or in receiving intimates. I never saw a
+French woman offer her hand to a male visitor, unless a relative, though
+it is quite common for females to kiss each other, when the _réunion_ is
+not an affair of ceremony. The practice of kissing among men still
+exists, though it is not very common at Paris. It appears, to be
+gradually going out with the earrings. I have never had an offer from a
+Frenchman, of my own age, to kiss me, but it has frequently occurred
+with my seniors. General Lafayette practises it still, with all his
+intimates.
+
+I was seated, the other evening, in quiet conversation, with Madame la
+Princesse de ----. Several people had come and gone in the course of an
+hour, and all had been received in the usual manner. At length the
+_huissier_, walking fast through the ante-chamber, announced the wife of
+an ambassador. The Princesse, at the moment, was seated on a divan, with
+her feet raised so as not to touch the floor. I was startled with the
+suddenness and vehemence of her movements. She sprang to her feet, and
+rather ran than walked across the vast _salon_ to the door, where she
+was met by her visitor, who, observing the _empressement_ of her
+hostess, through the vista of rooms, had rushed forward as fast as
+decorum would at all allow, in order to anticipate her at the door. It
+was my impression, at first, that they were bosom friends, about to be
+restored to each other, after a long absence, and that the impetuosity
+of their feelings had gotten the better of their ordinary self-command.
+No such thing; it was merely a strife of courtesy, for the meeting was
+followed by an extreme attention to all the forms of society, profound
+curtsies, and the elaborated demeanour which marks ceremony rather than
+friendship.
+
+Much has been said about the latitude of speech among the women of
+France, and comparisons have been made between them and our own females,
+to the disadvantage of the former. If the American usages are to be
+taken as the standard of delicacy in such matters, I know of no other
+people who come up to it. As to our mere feelings, habit can render
+anything proper, or anything improper, and it is not an easy matter to
+say where the line, in conformity with good sense and good taste, should
+be actually drawn. I confess a leaning to the American school, but how
+far I am influenced by education it would not be easy for me to say
+myself. Foreigners affirm that we are squeamish, and that we wound
+delicacy oftener by the awkward attempts to protect it, than if we had
+more simplicity. There may be some truth in this, for though cherishing
+the notions of my youth, I never belonged to the ultra school at home,
+which, I believe you will agree with me, rather proves low breeding than
+good breeding. One sees instances of this truth, not only every day, but
+every hour of the day. Yesterday, in crossing the Tuileries, I was
+witness of a ludicrous scene that sufficiently illustrates what I mean.
+The statues of the garden have little or no drapery. A countryman, and
+two women of the same class, in passing one, were struck with this
+circumstance, and their bursts of laughter, running and hiding their
+faces, and loud giggling, left no one in ignorance of the cause of their
+extreme bashfulness. Thousands of both sexes pass daily beneath the same
+statue, without a thought of its nudity, and it is looked upon as a
+noble piece of sculpture.
+
+In dismissing this subject, which is every way delicate, I shall merely
+say that usage tolerates a license of speech, of which you probably have
+no idea, but that I think one hears very rarely from a French woman of
+condition little that would not be uttered by an American female under
+similar circumstances. So far as my experience goes, there is a marked
+difference in this particular between the women of a middle station and
+those of a higher rank; by rank, however, I mean hereditary rank, for
+The revolution has made a _pêle mêle_ in the _salons_ of Paris.
+
+Although the _petits soupers_ have disappeared, the dinners are very
+sufficient substitutes: they are given at a better hour; and the service
+of a French entertainment, so quiet, so entirely free from effort, or
+chatter about food, is admirably adapted to rendering them agreeable. I
+am clearly of opinion that no one ought to give any entertainment that
+has not the means of making it pass off as a matter-of-course thing, and
+without effort. I have certainly seen a few fussy dinners here, but they
+are surprisingly rare. At home, we have plenty of people who know that a
+party that has a laboured air is inherently vulgar, but how few are
+there that know how to treat a brilliant entertainment as a mere matter
+of course! Paris is full of those desirable houses in which the thing is
+understood.
+
+The forms of the table vary a little, according to the set one is in. In
+truly French houses, until quite lately, I believe, it was not the
+custom to change the knife,--the duty of which, by the way, is not
+great, the cookery requiring little more than the fork. In families that
+mingle more with strangers, both are changed, as with us. A great dinner
+is served very much as at home, so far as the mere courses are
+concerned, though I have seen the melons follow the soup. This I believe
+to be in good taste, though it is not common; and it struck me at first
+as being as much out of season as the old New England custom of eating
+the pudding before the meat. But the French give small dinners (small in
+name, though certainly very great in execution), in which the dishes are
+served singly or nearly so, the entertainment resembling those given by
+the Turks, and being liable to the same objection; for when there is but
+a single dish before one, and it is not known whether there is to be any
+more, it is an awkward thing to decline eating. Such dinners are
+generally of the best quality, but I think they should never be given,
+except where there is sufficient intimacy to embolden the guest to say
+_jam satis_.
+
+The old devotion to the sex is not so exclusively the occupation of a
+French _salon_ as it was probably half a century since. I have been in
+several, where the men were grouped in a corner talking politics, while
+the women amused each other as best they could, in cold, formal lines,
+looking like so many figures placed there to show off the latest modes
+of the toilette. I do not say this is absolutely common, but it is less
+rare than you might be apt to suppose.
+
+I can tell you little of the habit of reading manuscripts in society.
+Such things are certainly done, for I have been invited to be present on
+one or two occasions; but having a horror of such exhibitions, I make it
+a point to be indisposed, the choice lying between the megrims before or
+after them. Once, and once only, I have heard a poet recite his verses
+in a well-filled drawing-room; and though I have every reason to think
+him clever, my ear was so little accustomed to the language, that, in
+the mouthing of French recitation, I lost nearly all of it.
+
+I have had an odd pleasure in driving from one house to another, on
+particular evenings, in order to produce as strong contrasts as my
+limited visiting-list will procure. Having a fair opportunity a few
+nights since, in consequence of two or three invitations coming in for
+the evening on which several houses where I occasionally called were
+opened, I determined to make a night of it, in order to note the effect.
+As A---- did not know several of the people, I went alone, and you may
+possibly be amused with an account of my adventures: they shall be told.
+
+In the first place, I had to dress, in order to go to dinner at a house
+that I had never entered, and with a family of which I had never seen a
+soul. These are incidents which frequently come over a stranger, and at
+first were not a little awkward; but use hardens us to much greater
+misfortunes. At six, then, I stepped punctually into my _coupé_, and
+gave Charles the necessary number and street. I ought to tell you that
+the invitation had come a few days before, and in a fit of curiosity I
+had accepted it, and sent a card, without having the least idea who my
+host and hostess were, beyond their names. There was something _piquant_
+in this ignorance, and I had almost made up my mind to go in the same
+mysterious manner, leaving all to events, when happening, in an idle
+moment, to ask a lady of my acquaintance, and for whom I have a great
+respect, if she knew a Madame de ----, to my surprise, her answer was,
+"Most certainly; she is my cousin, and you are to dine there to-morrow."
+I said no more, though this satisfied me that my hosts were people of
+some standing. While driving to their hotel, it struck me, under all the
+circumstances, it might be well to know more of them, and I stopped at
+the gate of a female friend, who knows everybody, and who, I was
+certain, would receive me even at that unseasonable hour. I was
+admitted, explained my errand, and inquired if she knew a M. de ----.
+"Quelle question!" she exclaimed--"M. de ---- est Chancelier de France!"
+Absurd and even awkward as it might have proved, but for this lucky
+thought, I should have dined with the French Lord High Chancellor,
+without having the smallest suspicion of who he was!
+
+The hotel was a fine one, though the apartment was merely good, and the
+reception, service, and general style of the house were so simple that
+neither would have awakened the least suspicion of the importance of my
+hosts. The party was small and the dinner modest. I found the
+_chancelier_ a grave dignified man, a little curious on the subject of
+America, and his wife apparently a woman of great good sense, and I
+should think, of a good deal of attainment. Everything went off in the
+quietest manner possible, and I was sorry when it was time to go.
+
+From this dinner, I drove to the hotel of the Marquis de Marbois, to pay
+a visit of digestion. M. de Marbois retires so early, on account of his
+great age, that one is obliged to be punctual, or he will find the gate
+locked at nine. The company had got back into the drawing-room, and as
+the last week's guests were mostly there, as well as those who had just
+left the table, there might have been thirty people present, all of whom
+were men but two. One of the ladies was Madame de Souza, known in French
+literature as the writer of several clever novels of society. In the
+drawing-room were grouped, in clusters, the Grand Referendary, M.
+Cuvier, M. Daru, M. Villemain, M. de Plaisance, Mr. Brown, and many
+others of note. There seemed to be something in the wind, as the
+conversation was in low confidential whispers, attended by divers
+ominous shrugs. This could only be politics, and watching an
+opportunity, I questioned an acquaintance. The fact was really so. The
+appointed hour had come and the ministry of M. de Villèle was in the
+agony. The elections had not been favourable, and it was expedient to
+make an attempt to reach the old end, by what is called a new
+combination. It is necessary to understand the general influence of
+political intrigues on certain _côteries_ of Paris, to appreciate the
+effect of this intelligence, on a drawing-room filled, like this, with
+men who had been actors in the principal events of France for forty
+years. The name of M. Cuvier was even mentioned as one of the new
+ministers. Comte Roy was also named as likely to be the new premier. I
+was told that this gentleman was one of the greatest landed proprietors
+of France, his estates being valued at four millions of dollars. The
+fact is curious, as showing, not on vulgar rumour, but from a
+respectable source, what is deemed a first-rate landed property in this
+country. It is certainly no merit, nor do I believe it is any very great
+advantage; but I think we might materially beat this, even in America.
+The company soon separated, and I retired.
+
+From the Place de la Madeleine, I drove to a house near the Carrousel,
+where I had been invited to step in, in the course of the evening. All
+the buildings that remain within the intended parallelogram, which will
+some day make this spot one of the finest squares in the world, have
+been bought by the government, or nearly so, with the intent to have
+them pulled down, at a proper time; and the court bestows lodgings, _ad
+interim_, among them, on its favourites. Madame de ---- was one of these
+favoured persons, and she occupies a small apartment in the third story
+of one of these houses. The rooms were neat and well-arranged, but
+small. Probably the largest does not exceed fifteen feet square. The
+approach to a Paris lodging is usually either very good, or very bad. In
+the new buildings may be found some of the mediocrity of the new order
+of things; but in all those which were erected previously to the
+revolution, there is nothing but extremes in this, as in most other
+things: great luxury and elegance, or great meanness and discomfort. The
+house of Madame de ---- happens to be of the latter class, and although
+all the disagreeables have disappeared from her own rooms, one is
+compelled to climb up to them, through a dark well of a staircase, by
+flights of steps not much better than those we use in our stables. You
+have no notion of such staircases as those I had just descended in the
+hotels of the _chancelier_ and the _président premier_;[25] nor have we
+any just idea, as connected with respectable dwellings, of these I had
+now to clamber up. M. de ---- is a man of talents and great
+respectability, and his wife is exceedingly clever, but they are not
+rich. He is a professor, and she is an artist. After having passed so
+much of my youth on top-gallant yards, and in becketting royals, you are
+not to suppose, however, I had any great difficulty in getting up these
+stairs, narrow, steep, and winding as they were.
+
+[Footnote 25: M. de Marbois was the first president of the Court of
+Accounts.]
+
+We are now at the door, and I have rung. On whom do you imagine the
+curtain will rise? On a _réunion_ of philosophers come to discuss
+questions in botany, with M. de ----, or on artists, assembled to talk
+over the troubles of their profession, with his wife? The door opens,
+and I enter.
+
+The little drawing-room is crowded; chiefly with men. Two card-tables
+are set, and at one I recognize a party, in which are three dukes of the
+_vieille cour_, with M. de Duras at their head! The rest of the company
+was a little more mixed, but, on the whole, it savoured strongly of
+Coblentz and the _émigration_. This was more truly French than anything
+I had yet stumbled on. One or two of the grandees looked at me as if,
+better informed than Scott, they knew that General Lafayette had not
+gone to America to live. Some of these gentlemen certainly do not love
+us; but I had cut out too much work for the night to stay and return the
+big looks of even dukes, and, watching an opportunity, when the eyes of
+Madame de ---- were another way, I stole out of the room.
+
+Charles now took his orders, and we drove down into the heart of the
+town somewhere near the general post-office, or into those mazes of
+streets that near two years of practice have not yet taught me to
+thread. We entered the court of a large hotel, that was brilliantly
+lighted, and I ascended, by a noble flight of steps, to the first floor.
+Ante-chambers communicated with a magnificent saloon, which appeared to
+be near forty feet square. The ceilings were lofty, and the walls were
+ornamented with military trophies, beautifully designed, and which had
+the air of being embossed and gilded. I had got into the hotel of one of
+Napoleon's marshals, you will say, or at least into one of a marshal of
+the old _régime_. The latter conjecture may be true, but the house is
+now inhabited by a great woollen manufacturer, whom the events of the
+day has thrown into the presence of all these military emblems. I found
+the worthy _industriel_ surrounded by a group, composed of men of his
+own stamp, eagerly discussing the recent changes in the government. The
+women, of whom there might have been a dozen, were ranged, like a
+neglected parterre, along the opposite side of the room. I paid my
+compliments, staid a few minutes, and stole away to the next engagement.
+
+We had now to go to a little retired house on the Champs Elysées. There
+were only three or four carriages before the door, and on ascending to a
+small but very near apartment, I found some twenty people collected. The
+mistress of the house was an English lady, single, of a certain age, and
+a daughter of the Earl of ----, who was once governor of New York. Here
+was a very different set. One or two ladies of the old court, women of
+elegant manners, and seemingly of good information,--several English
+women, pretty, quiet, and clever, besides a dozen men of different
+nations. This was one of those little _réunions_ that are so common in
+Paris, among the foreigners, in which a small infusion of French serves
+to leaven a considerable batch of human beings from other parts of the
+world. As it is always a relief to me to speak my own language, after
+being a good while among foreigners, I staid an hour at this house. In
+the course of the evening an Irishman of great wit and of exquisite
+humour, one of the paragons of the age in his way, came in. In the
+course of conversation, this gentleman, who is the proprietor of an
+Irish estate, and a Catholic, told me of an atrocity in the laws of his
+country, of which until then I was ignorant. It seems that any younger
+brother, next heir, might claim the estate by turning Protestant, or
+drive the incumbent to the same act. I was rejoiced to hear that there
+was hardly an instance of such profligacy known.[26] To what baseness
+will not the struggle for political ascendency urge us!
+
+[Footnote 26: I believe this infamous law, however, has been repealed.]
+
+In the course of the evening, Mr. ----, the Irish gentleman, gravely
+introduced me to a Sir James ----, adding, with perfect gravity, "a
+gentleman whose father humbugged the Pope--humbugged infallibility." One
+could not but be amused with such an introduction, urged in a way so
+infinitely droll, and I ventured, at a proper moment, to ask an
+explanation, which, unless I was also humbugged, was as follows:--
+
+Among the _détenus_ in 1804, was Sir William ----, the father of Sir
+James ----, the person in question. Taking advantage of the presence of
+the Pope at Paris, he is said to have called on the good-hearted Pius,
+with great concern of manner, to state his case. He had left his sons in
+England, and through his absence they had fallen under the care of two
+Presbyterian aunts; as a father he was naturally anxious to rescue them
+from this perilous situation. "Now Pius," continued my merry informant,
+"quite naturally supposed that all this solicitude was in behalf of two
+orthodox Catholic souls, and he got permission from Napoleon for the
+return of so good a father to his own country, never dreaming that the
+conversion of the boys, if it ever took place, would only be from the
+Protestant Episcopal Church of England, to that of Calvin; or a rescue
+from one of the devil's furnaces, to pop them into another." I laughed
+at this story, I suppose with a little incredulity, but my Irish friend
+insisted on its truth, ending the conversation with a significant nod,
+Catholic as he was, and saying--"humbugged infallibility!"
+
+By this time it was eleven o'clock, and as I am obliged to keep
+reasonable hours, it was time to go to _the_ party of the evening. Count
+----, of the ---- Legation, gave a great ball. My carriage entered the
+line at the distance of near a quarter of a mile from the hotel;
+gendarmes being actively employed in keeping us all in our places. It
+was half an hour before I was set down, and the quadrilles were in full
+motion when I entered. It was a brilliant affair, much the most so I
+have ever yet witnessed in a private house. Some said there were fifteen
+hundred people present. The number seems incredible, and yet, when one
+comes to calculate, it may be so. As I got into my carriage to go away,
+Charles informed me that the people at the gates affirmed that more than
+six hundred carriages had entered the court that evening. By allowing an
+average of little more than two to each vehicle, we get the number
+mentioned.
+
+I do not know exactly how many rooms were opened on this occasion, but I
+should think there were fully a dozen. Two or three were very large
+salons, and the one in the centre, which was almost at fever-heat, had
+crimson hangings, by way of cooling one. I have never witnessed dancing
+at all comparable to that of the quadrilles of this evening. Usually
+there is either too much or too little of the dancing-master, but on
+this occasion every one seemed inspired with a love of the art. It was a
+beautiful sight to see a hundred charming young women, of the first
+families of Europe, for they were there of all nations, dressed with the
+simple elegance that is so becoming to the young of the sex, and which
+is never departed from here until after marriage, moving in perfect time
+to delightful music, as if animated by a common soul. The men, too, did
+better than usual, being less lugubrious and mournful than our sex is
+apt to be in dancing. I do not know how it is in private, but in the
+world, at Paris, every young woman seems to have a good mother; or, at
+least, one capable of giving her both a good tone and good taste.
+
+At this party I met the ----, an intimate friend of the ambassador, and
+one who also honours me with a portion of her friendship. In talking
+over the appearance of things, she told me that some hundreds of
+_applications for invitations_ to this ball had been made.
+"Applications! I cannot conceive of such meanness. In what manner?"
+"Directly; by note, by personal intercession--almost by tears. Be
+certain of it, many hundreds have been refused." In America we hear of
+refusals to go to balls, but we have not yet reached the pass of sending
+refusals to invite! "Do you see Mademoiselle ----, dancing in the set
+before you?" She pointed to a beautiful French girl, whom I had often
+seen at her house, but whose family was in a much lower station in
+society than herself, "Certainly--pray how came she here?" "I brought
+her. Her mother was dying to come, too, and she begged me to get an
+invitation for her and her daughter; but it would not do to bring the
+mother to such a place, and I was obliged to say no more tickets could
+be issued. I wished, however, to bring the daughter, she is so
+pretty, and we compromised the affair in that way." "And to this the
+mother assented!" "Assented! How can you doubt it--what funny American
+notions you have brought with you to France!"
+
+I got some droll anecdotes from my companion, concerning the ingredients
+of the company on this occasion, for she could be as sarcastic as she
+was elegant. A young woman near us attracted attention by a loud and
+vulgar manner of laughing. "Do you know that lady?" demanded my
+neighbour. "I have seen her before, but scarcely know her name." "She is
+the daughter of your acquaintance, the Marquise de ----." "Then she is,
+or was, a Mademoiselle de ----." "She is not, nor properly ever was, a
+Mademoiselle de ----. In the revolution the Marquis was imprisoned by
+you wicked republicans, and the Marquise fled to England, whence she
+returned, after an absence of three years, bringing with her this young
+lady, then an infant a few months old." "And Monsieur le Marquis?" "He
+never saw his daughter, having been beheaded in Paris, about a year
+before her birth." "_Quelle contretems_!" "_N'est-ce pas_?"
+
+It is a melancholy admission, but it is no less true, that good breeding
+is sometimes quite as active a virtue as good principles. How many more
+of the company present were born about a year after their fathers were
+beheaded, I have no means of knowing; but had it been the case with all
+of them, the company would have been of as elegant demeanour, and of
+much more _retenue_ of deportment, than we are accustomed to see, I will
+not say in _good_, but certainly in _general_ society at home. One of
+the consequences of good breeding is also a disinclination, positively a
+distaste, to pry into the private affairs of others. The little specimen
+to the contrary just named was rather an exception, owing to the
+character of the individual, and to the indiscretion of the young lady
+in laughing too loud, and then the affair of a birth so _very_
+posthumous was rather too _patent_ to escape all criticism.
+
+My friend was in a gossiping mood this evening, and as she was well
+turned of fifty, I ventured to continue the conversation. As some of the
+_liaisons_ which exist here must be novel to you, I shall mention one or
+two more.
+
+A Madame de J---- passed us, leaning on the arm of M. de C----. I knew
+the former, who was a widow; had frequently visited her, and had been
+surprised at the intimacy which existed between her and M. de C----, who
+always appeared quite at home in her house. I ventured to ask my
+neighbour if the gentleman were the brother of the lady. "Her brother!
+It is to be hoped not, as he is her husband." "Why does she not bear his
+name, if that be the case?" "Because her first husband is of a more
+illustrious family than her second; and then there are some difficulties
+on the score of fortune. No, no. These people are _bona fide_ married.
+_Tenez_--do you see that gentleman who is standing so assiduously near
+the chair of Madame de S----? He who is all attention and smiles to the
+lady?" "Certainly--his politeness is even affectionate." "Well it ought
+to be, for it is M. de S----_, her husband." "They are a happy couple,
+then." "_Hors de doute--he meets her at _soirées_ and balls; is the pink
+of politeness; puts on her shawl; sees her safe into her carriage,
+and--" "Then they drive home together, as loving as Darby and Joan."
+"And then he jumps into his cabriolet, and drives to the lodgings of
+----. _Bon soir_, Monsieur;--you are making me fall into the vulgar
+crime of scandal."
+
+Now, as much as all this may sound like invention, it is quite true,
+that I repeat no more to you than was said to me, and no more than what
+I believe to be exact. As respects the latter couple, I have been
+elsewhere told that they literally never see each other, except in
+public, where they constantly meet, as the best friends in the world.
+
+I was lately in some English society, when Lady G---- bet a pair of
+gloves with Lord R---- that he had not seen Lady R---- in a fortnight.
+The bet was won by the gentleman, who proved satisfactorily that he had
+met his wife at a dinner-party, only ten days before.
+
+After all I have told you, and all that you may have heard from others,
+I am nevertheless inclined to believe, that the high society of Paris is
+quite as exemplary as that of any other large European town. If we are
+any better ourselves, is it not more owing to the absence of temptation,
+than to any other cause? Put large garrisons into our towns, fill the
+streets with idlers, who have nothing to do but to render themselves
+agreeable, and with women with whom dress and pleasure are the principal
+occupations, and then let us see what protestantism and liberty will
+avail us, in this particular. The intelligent French say that their
+society is improving in morals. I can believe this, of which I think
+there is sufficient proof by comparing the present with the past, as the
+latter has been described to us. By the past, I do not mean the period
+of the revolution, when vulgarity assisted to render vice still more
+odious--a happy union, perhaps, for those who were to follow--but the
+days of the old _régime_. Chance has thrown me in the way of three or
+four old dowagers of that period, women of high rank, and still in the
+first circles, who, amid all their _finesse_ of breeding, and ease of
+manner, have had a most desperate _roué_ air about them. Their very
+laugh, at times, has seemed replete with a bold levity, that was as
+disgusting as it was unfeminine. I have never, in any other part of the
+world, seen loose sentiments _affichés_ with more effrontery. These
+women are the complete antipodes of the quiet, elegant Princesse de
+----, who was at Lady ---- ----'s, this evening; though some of them
+write _Princesses_ on their cards, too.
+
+The influence of a court must be great on the morals of those who live
+in its purlieus. Conversing with the Duc de ----, a man who has had
+general currency in the best society of Europe, on this subject, he
+said, --"England has long decried our manners. Previously to the
+revolution, I admit they were bad; perhaps worst than her own; but I
+know nothing in our history as bad as what I lately witnessed in
+England. You know I was there quite recently. The king invited me to
+dine at Windsor. I found every one in the drawing-room, but His Majesty
+and Lady ----. She entered but a minute before him, like a queen. Her
+reception was that of a queen; young, unmarried females kissed her hand.
+Now, all this might happen in France, even now: but Louis XV. the most
+dissolute of our monarchs, went no farther. At Windsor, I saw the
+husband, sons, and daughters of the favourite, in the circle! _Le parc
+des Cerfs_ was not as bad as this."
+
+"And yet, M. de ----, since we are conversing frankly, listen to what I
+witnessed, but the other day, in France. You know the situation of
+things at St. Ouen, and the rumours that are so rife. We had the _Fête
+Dieu_, during my residence there. You, who are a Catholic, need not be
+told that your sect believe in the doctrine of the 'real presence.'
+There was a _reposoir_ erected in the garden of the chateau, and God, in
+person, was carried, with religious pomp, to rest in the bowers of the
+ex-favourite. It is true, the husband was not present: he was only in
+the provinces!"
+
+"The influence of a throne makes sad parasites and hypocrites," said M.
+de ----, shrugging his shoulders.
+
+"And the influence of the people, too, though in a different way. A
+courtier is merely a well-dressed demagogue."
+
+"It follows, then, that man is just a poor devil."
+
+But I am gossiping away with you, when my Asmodean career is ended, and
+it is time I went to bed. Good night!
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XIX.
+
+Garden of the Tuileries.--The French Parliament.--Parliamentary
+Speakers.--The Tribune.--Royal Initiative.--The Charter.--Mongrel
+Government.--Ministerial Responsibility.--Elections in
+France.--Doctrinaires.--Differences of Opinion.--Controversy.
+
+
+TO JACOB SUTHERLAND, ESQ. NEW YORK.
+
+The Chambers have been opened with the customary ceremonies and parade.
+It is usual for the king, attended by a brilliant _cortège_, to go, on
+these occasions, from the Tuileries to the Palais Bourbon, through lines
+of troops, under a salute of guns. The French love _spectacles_, and
+their monarch, if he would be popular, is compelled to make himself one,
+at every plausible opportunity.
+
+The garden of the Tuileries is a parallelogram, of, I should think,
+fifty acres, of which one end is bounded by the palace. It has a high
+vaulted terrace on the side next the river, as well as at the opposite
+end, and one a little lower, next the Rue de Rivoli. There is also a
+very low broad terrace, immediately beneath the windows of the palace,
+which separates the buildings from the parterres. You will understand
+that the effect of this arrangement is to shut out the world from the
+persons in the garden, by means of the terraces, and, indeed, to enable
+them, by taking refuge in the woods that fill quite half the area, to
+bury themselves almost in a forest. The public has free access to this
+place, from an early hour in the morning to eight or nine at night,
+according to the season. When it is required to clear them, a party of
+troops marches, by beat of drum, from the chateau, through the great
+_allée_, to the lower end of the garden. This is always taken as the
+signal to disperse, and the world begins to go out, at the different
+gates. It is understood that the place is frequently used as a
+promenade, by the royal family, after this hour, especially in the fine
+season; but, as it would be quite easy for any one, evilly disposed, to
+conceal himself among the trees, statues, and shrubs, the troops are
+extended in very open order, and march slowly back to the palace, of
+course driving every one before them. Each gate is locked, as the line
+passes it.
+
+The only parts of the garden, which appear, on the exterior, to be on a
+level with the street, though such is actually the fact with the whole
+of the interior, are the great gate opposite the palace, and a side gate
+near its southern end; the latter being the way by which one passes out,
+to cross the Pont Royal.
+
+In attempting to pass in at this gate the other morning, for the first
+time, at that hour, I found it closed. A party of ladies and gentlemen
+were walking on the low terrace, beneath the palace windows, and a
+hundred people might have been looking at them from without. A second
+glance showed me, that among some children, were the heir presumptive,
+and his sister Mademoiselle d'Artois. The exhibition could merely be an
+attempt to feel the public pulse, for the country-house of La Bagatelle,
+to which the children go two or three times a week, is much better
+suited to taking the air. I could not believe in the indifference that
+was manifested, had I not seen it. The children are both engaging,
+particularly the daughter, and yet these innocent and perfectly
+inoffensive beings were evidently regarded more with aversion than with
+affection.
+
+The display of the opening of the session produced no more effect on the
+public mind, than the appearance on the terrace of _les Enfans de
+France_. The Parisians are the least loyal of Charles's subjects, and
+though the troops, and a portion of the crowd, cried "Vive le Roi!" it
+was easy to see that the disaffected were more numerous than the
+well-affected.
+
+I have attended some of the sittings since the opening, and shall now
+say a word on the subject of the French Parliamentary proceedings. The
+hall is an amphitheatre, like our own; the disposition of the seats and
+speaker's chair being much the same as at Washington. The members sit on
+benches, however, that rise one behind the other, and through which they
+ascend and descend, by aisles. These aisles separate the different
+shades of opinion, for those who think alike sit together. Thus the
+_gauche_ or left is occupied by the extreme liberals; the _centre
+gauche_, by those who are a shade nearer the Bourbons. The _centre
+droit_, or right centre, by the true Bourbonists, and so on, to the
+farthest point of the semi-circle. Some of the members affect even to
+manifest the minuter shades of their opinions by their relative
+positions in their own sections, and I believe it is usual for each one
+to occupy his proper place.
+
+You probably know that the French members speak from a stand immediately
+beneath the chair of the president, called a tribune. Absurd as this may
+seem, I believe it to be a very useful regulation, the vivacity of the
+national character rendering some such check on loquacity quite
+necessary. Without it, a dozen would often be on their feet at once; as
+it is, even, this sometimes happens. No disorder that ever occurs in our
+legislative bodies, will give you any just notion of that which
+frequently occurs here. The president rings a bell as a summons to keep
+order, and as a last resource he puts on his hat, a signal that the
+sitting is suspended.
+
+The speaking of both chambers is generally bad. Two-thirds of the
+members read their speeches, which gives the sitting a dull, monotonous
+character, and, as you may suppose, the greater part of their lectures
+are very little attended to. The most parliamentary speaker is M. Royer
+Collard, who is, just now, so popular that he has been returned for
+seven different places at the recent election.
+
+M. Constant is an exceedingly animated speaker, resembling in this
+particular Mr. M'Duffie. M. Constant, however, has a different motion
+from the last gentleman, his movement being a constant oscillation over
+the edge of the tribune, about as fast, and almost as regular, as that
+of the pendulum of a large clock. It resembles that of a sawyer in the
+Mississippi. General Lafayette speaks with the steadiness and calm that
+you would expect from his character, and is always listened to with
+respect. Many professional men speak well, and exercise considerable
+influence in the house; for here, as elsewhere, the habit of public and
+extemporaneous speaking gives an immediate ascendency in deliberative
+bodies.
+
+Some of the scenes one witnesses in the Chamber of Deputies are amusing
+by their exceeding vivacity. The habit of crying "Écoutez!" prevails, as
+in the English parliament, though the different intonations of that cry
+are not well understood. I have seen members run at the tribune, like
+children playing puss in a corner; and, on one occasion, I saw five
+different persons on its steps, in waiting for the descent of the member
+in possession. When a great question is to be solemnly argued, the
+members inscribe their names for the discussion, and are called on to
+speak in the order in which they stand on the list.
+
+The French never sit in committee of the whole, but they have adopted in
+its place an expedient, that gives power more control over the
+proceedings of the two houses. At the commencement of the session, the
+members draw for their numbers in the _bureaux_, as they are called. Of
+these _bureaux_, there are ten or twelve, and, as a matter of course,
+they include all the members. As soon as the numbers are drawn, the
+members assemble in their respective rooms, and choose their officers; a
+president and secretary. These elections are always supposed to be
+indicative of the political tendency of each _bureau_; those which have
+a majority of liberals, choosing officers of their own opinions, and
+_vice versa_. These _bureaux_ are remodelled, periodically, by drawing
+anew; the term of duration being a month or six weeks. I believe the
+chamber retains the power to refer questions, or not, to these
+_bureaux_; their institution being no more than a matter of internal
+regulation, and not of constitutional law. It is, however, usual to send
+all important laws to them, where they are discussed and voted on; the
+approbation of a majority of the _bureaux_ being, in such cases,
+necessary for their reception in the chambers.
+
+The great evil of the present system is the initiative of the king. By
+this reservation in the charter, the crown possesses more than a veto,
+all laws actually emanating from the sovereign. The tendency of such a
+regulation is either to convert the chambers into the old _lits de
+justice_, or to overthrow the throne, an event which will certainly
+accompany any serious change here. As might have been, as _would_ have
+been anticipated, by any one familiar with the action of legislative
+bodies, in our time, this right is already so vigorously assailed, as to
+give rise to constant contentions between the great powers of the state.
+All parties are agreed that no law can be presented, that does not come
+originally from the throne; but the liberals are for putting so wide a
+construction on the right to amend, as already to threaten to pervert
+the regulation. This has driven some of the Bourbonists to maintain that
+the chambers have no right, at all, to amend a royal proposition. Any
+one may foresee, that this is a state of things which cannot peaceably
+endure for any great length of time. The ministry are compelled to pack
+the chambers, and in order to effect their objects, they resort to all
+the expedients of power that offer. As those who drew up the charter had
+neither the forethought, nor the experience, to anticipate all the
+embarrassments of a parliamentary government, they unwittingly committed
+themselves, and illegal acts are constantly resorted to, in order that
+the system may be upheld. The charter was bestowed _ad captandum_, and
+is a contradictory _mélange_ of inexpedient concessions and wily
+reservations. The conscription undermined the popularity of Napoleon,
+and Louis XVIII. in his charter says, "The conscription is abolished;
+the _recruiting_ for the army and navy shall be settled by a law." Now
+the conscription _is not_ abolished; but, if pushed on this point, a
+French jurist would perhaps tell you it is _now_ established by law. The
+feudal exclusiveness, on the subject of taxation, is done away with, all
+men being equally liable to taxation. The nett pay of the army is about
+two sous a day; _this_ is settled by law, passed by the representatives
+of those who pay two hundred francs a year, in direct taxation. The
+conscription, in appearance, is general and fair enough; but he who has
+money can always hire a substitute, at a price quite within his power.
+It is only the poor man, who is never in possession of one or two
+thousand francs, that is obliged to serve seven years at two sous a day,
+nett.
+
+France has gained, beyond estimate, by the changes from the old to the
+present system, but it is in a manner to render further violent changes
+necessary. I say _violent_, for political changes are everywhere
+unavoidable, since questions of polity are, after all, no other than
+questions of facts, and these are interests that will regulate
+themselves, directly or indirectly. The great desideratum of a
+government, after settling its principles in conformity with controlling
+facts, is to secure to itself the means of progressive change, without
+the apprehension of convulsion. Such is not the case with France, and
+further revolutions are inevitable. The mongrel government which exists,
+neither can stand, nor does it deserve to stand. It contains the seeds
+of its own destruction. Here, you will be told, that the King is a
+Jesuit, that he desires to return to the ancient regime, and that the
+opposition wishes merely to keep him within the limits of the charter.
+My own observations lead to a very different conclusion. The difficulty
+is in the charter itself, which leaves the government neither free nor
+despotic; in short, without any distinctive character.
+
+This defect is so much felt, that, in carrying out the details of the
+system, much that properly belongs to it has been studiously omitted.
+The king can do no wrong, here, as in England, but the ministers are
+responsible. By way of making a parade of this responsibility, every
+official act of the king is countersigned by the minister of the proper
+department, and, by the theory of the government, that particular
+minister is responsible for that particular act. Now, by the charter,
+the peers are the judges of political crimes. By the charter, also, it
+is stipulated that no one can be proceeded against except in cases
+expressly provided for by law and in the _forms_ prescribed by the law.
+You will remember that, all the previous constitutions being declared
+illegal, Louis XVIII. dates his reign from the supposed death of Louis
+XVII. and that there are no fundamental precedents that may be drawn in
+to aid the constructions, but that the charter must be interpreted by
+its own provisions. It follows, then, as a consequence, that no minister
+can be legally punished until a law is enacted to dictate the
+punishment, explain the offences, and point out the forms of procedure.
+Now, no such law has ever been proposed, and although the chambers may
+_recommend_ laws to the king, they must await his pleasure in order even
+to discuss them openly, and enlist the public feeling in their behalf.
+The responsibility of the ministers was proposed _ad captandum_, like
+the abolition of the conscription, but neither has been found convenient
+in practice.[27]
+
+[Footnote 27: When the ministers of Charles X. were tried, it was without
+law, and they would probably have escaped punishment altogether, on this
+plea, had not the condition of the public mind required a concession.]
+
+
+The electors of France are said to be between eighty and one hundred
+thousand. The qualifications of a deputy being much higher than those of
+an elector, it is computed that the four hundred and fifty members must
+be elected from among some four or five thousand available candidates.
+It is not pretended that France does not contain more than this number
+of individuals who pay a thousand francs a year in direct taxes, for
+taxation is so great that this sum is soon made up; but a deputy must be
+forty years old, a regulation which at once excludes fully one half the
+men, of itself; and then it will be recollected that many are
+superannuated, several hundreds are peers, others cannot quit their
+employments, etc. etc. I have seen the number of available candidates
+estimated as low, even, as three thousand.
+
+The elections in France are conducted in a mode peculiar to the nation.
+The electors of the highest class have two votes, or for representatives
+of two descriptions. This plan was an after-thought of the king, for the
+original charter contains no such regulation, but the munificent father
+of the national liberties saw fit, subsequently, to qualify his gift.
+Had Louis XVIII. lived a little longer, he would most probably have been
+dethroned before this; the hopes and expectations which usually
+accompany a new reign having, most probably, deferred the crisis for a
+few years. The electors form themselves into colleges, into which no one
+who is not privileged to vote is admitted. This is a good regulation,
+and might be copied to advantage at home. A law prescribing certain
+limits around each poll, and rendering it penal for any but those
+authorized to vote at that particular poll, to cross it, would greatly
+purify our elections. The government, here, appoints the presiding
+officer of each electoral college, and the selection is always carefully
+made of one in the interests of the ministry; though in what manner such
+a functionary can influence the result, is more than I can tell you. It
+is, however, thought to be favourable to an individual's own election to
+get this nomination. The vote is by ballot, though the charter secures
+no such privilege. Indeed that instrument is little more than a
+declaration of rights, fortified by a few general constituent laws.
+
+The same latitude exists here, in the constructions of the charter, as
+exists at home, in the constructions of the constitution. The French
+have, however, one great advantage over us, in daring to think for
+themselves; for, though there is a party of _doctrinaires_, who wish to
+imitate England, too, it is neither a numerous nor a strong party. These
+_doctrinaires_, as the name implies, are men who wish to defer to
+theories, rather than facts; a class that is to be found all over the
+world. For obvious reasons, the English system has admirers throughout
+Europe, as well as in America, since nothing can be more agreeable, for
+those who are in a situation to look forward to such an advantage, than
+to see themselves elevated into, as Lafayette expresses, so many "little
+legitimacies." The peerage, with its exclusive and hereditary benefits,
+is the aim of all the nobility of Europe, and wishes of this sort make
+easy converts to any philosophy that may favour the desire.
+
+One meets, here, with droll evidences of the truth of what I have just
+told you. I have made the acquaintance of a Russian of very illustrious
+family, and he has always been loud and constant in his eulogiums of
+America and her liberty. Alluding to the subject, the other day, he
+amused me by _naïvely_ observing, "Ah, you are a happy people--you are
+_free_--and so are the _English_. Now, in Russia, all rank depends on
+the commission one bears in the army, or on the will of the Emperor. I
+am a Prince; my father was a Prince; my grandfather, too; but it is of
+no avail. I get no privileges by my birth; whereas, in England, where I
+have been, it is so different--And I dare say it is different in
+America, too?" I told him it was, indeed, "very different in America."
+He sighed, and seemed to envy me.
+
+The party of the _doctrinaires_ is the one that menaces the most serious
+evil to France. It is inherently the party of aristocracy; and, in a
+country as far advanced as France, it is the combinations of the few,
+that, after all, are most to be apprehended. The worst of it is, that,
+in countries where abuses have so long existed, the people get to be so
+disqualified for entertaining free institutions, that even the
+disinterested and well-meaning are often induced to side with the
+rapacious and selfish, to prevent the evils of reaction.
+
+In a country so much inclined to speculate, to philosophize, and to
+reason on everything, it is not surprising that a fundamental law, as
+vaguely expressed as the charter, should leave ample room for
+discussion. We find that our own long experience in these written
+instruments does not protect us from violent differences of opinion,
+some of which are quite as extravagant as any that exist here, though
+possibly less apt to lead to as grave consequences.[28]
+
+[Footnote 28: The discussion which grew out of the law to protect
+American industry, affords a singular instance of the manner in which
+clever men can persuade themselves and others into any notion, however
+extravagant. The uncouth doctrine of nullification turned on the
+construction that might be put on the intimacy of the relations created
+by the Union, and on the nature of the sovereignties of the states.
+
+Because the constitution commences with a declaration, that it is formed
+and adopted by "we the people of the United States," overlooking, not
+only all the facts of the case, but misconceiving the very meaning of
+the words they quote, one party virtually contended, that the instrument
+was formed by a consolidated nation. On this point their argument,
+certainly sustained in part by unanswerable truth, mainly depends.
+
+The word "people" has notoriously several significations. It means a
+"population;" it means the "vulgar;" it means any particular portion of
+a population, as, "rich people," "poor people," "mercantile people,"
+etc. etc. In a political sense, it has always been understood to mean
+that portion of the population of a country, which is possessed of
+_political rights_. On this sense, then, it means a _constituency_ in a
+representative government, and so it has always been understood in
+England, and is understood to-day in France. When a question is referred
+to the "people" at an election in England, it is not referred to a tithe
+of the population, but to a particular portion of it. In South Carolina
+and Louisiana, in the popular sense of Mr. Webster, there is no "people"
+to refer to, a majority of the men of both states possessing no civil
+rights, and scarcely having civil existence. Besides, "people," in its
+broad signification, includes men, women, and children, and no one will
+contend, that the two latter had anything to do with the formation of
+our constitution. It follows, then, that the term has been used in a
+limited sense, and we must look to incidental facts to discover its
+meaning.
+
+The convention was chosen, not by any common constituency, but by the
+constituencies of the several states, which, at that time, embraced
+every gradation between a democratical and an aristocratically polity.
+Thirteen states existed in 1787, and yet the constitution was to go into
+effect when it was adopted by any nine of them. It will not be pretended
+that this decision would be binding on the other four, and yet it is
+possible that these four dissenting states should contain more than half
+of all the population of the confederation. It would be very easy to put
+a proposition, in which it might be demonstrated arithmetically, that
+the constitution could have been adopted against a considerable majority
+of whole numbers. In the face of such a fact, it is folly to suppose the
+term "people" is used in any other than a conventional sense. It is well
+known, in addition to the mode of its adoption, that every provision of
+the constitution can be altered, with a single exception, by
+three-fourths of the states. Perhaps more than half of the entire
+population (excluding the Territories and the District), is in six of
+the largest states, at this moment. But whether this be so or not, such
+a combination could easily he made, as would demonstrate that less than
+a third of the population of the country can at any time alter the
+constitution.
+
+It is probable that the term "we the people," was used in a sort of
+contradistinction to the old implied right of the sovereignty of the
+king, just as we idly substituted the words "God save the people" at the
+end of a proclamation, for "God save the king." It was a form. But, if
+it is desirable to affix to them any more precise signification, it will
+not do to generalize according to the argument of one party; but we are
+to take the words, in their limited and appropriate meaning and with
+their accompanying facts. They can only allude to the constituencies,
+and these constituencies existed only _through_ the states, and were as
+varied as their several systems. If the meaning of the term "we the
+people" was misconceived, it follows that the argument which was drawn
+from the error was worthless. The constitution of the United States was
+not formed by the _people_ of the United States, but by such a portion
+of them as it suited the several states to invest with political powers,
+and under such combinations as gave the decision to anything but a
+majority of the nation. In other words, the constitution was certainly
+formed by the _states_ as _political bodies_, and without any necessary
+connexion with any general or uniform system of polity.
+
+Any theory based on the separate sovereignties of the states, has, on
+the other hand, a frail support. The question was not _who_ formed the
+constitution, but _what_ was formed. All the great powers of
+sovereignty, such as foreign relations, the right to treat, make war and
+peace, to control commerce, to coin money, etc. etc. are expressly
+ceded. But these are not, after all, the greatest blows that are given
+to the doctrine of reserved sovereignty. A power to _alter_ the
+constitution, as has just been remarked, has been granted, by which even
+the _dissenting states_ have become bound. The only right reserved, is
+that of the equal representation in the senate, and it would follow,
+perhaps, as a legitimate consequence, the preservation of the
+confederated polity; but South Carolina could, under the theory of the
+constitution, be stripped of her right to control nearly every social
+interest; every man, woman and child in the state dissenting. It is
+scarcely worth while to construct a sublimated theory, on the
+sovereignty of a community so situated by the legitimate theory of the
+government under which it actually exists!
+
+No means can be devised, that will always protect the weak from the
+aggressions of the strong, under the forms of law; and nature has
+pointed out the remedy, when the preponderance of good is against
+submission; but one cannot suppress his expression of astonishment, at
+finding any respectable portion of a reasoning community, losing sight
+of this simple and self-evident truth, to uphold a doctrine as weak as
+that of nullification, viewed as a legal remedy.
+
+If the American statesmen (_quasi_ and real) would imitate the good
+curate and the bachelor of Don Quixote, by burning all the political
+heresies, with which their libraries, not to say their brains, are now
+crammed, and set seriously about studying the terms and the nature of
+the national compact, without reference to the notions of men who had no
+connexion with the country, the public would be the gainers, and
+occasionally one of them might stand a chance of descending to posterity
+in some other light than that of the mere leader of a faction.]
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XX.
+
+Excursion with Lafayette.--Vincennes.--The Donjon.--Lagrange.--The
+Towers.--Interior of the House--the General's Apartments.--the Cabinet.
+--Lafayette's Title.--Church of the Chateau.--Ruins of Vivier.--Roman
+Remains.--American Curiosity.--The Table at Lagrange.--Swindling.
+
+
+To R. COOPER, ESQ. COOPERSTOWN.
+
+I have said nothing to you of Lagrange, though I have now been there no
+less than three times. Shortly after our arrival in Paris, General
+Lafayette had the kindness to send us an invitation; but we were
+deterred from going for sometime, by the indisposition of one of the
+family. In the autumn of 1826, I went, however, alone; in the spring I
+went again, carrying Mrs. ---- with me; and I have now just returned from
+a third visit, in which I went with my wife, accompanied by one or two
+more of the family.
+
+It is about twenty-seven miles from Paris to Rosay, a small town that is
+a league from the castle. This is not a post-route, the great road
+ending at Rosay, and we were obliged to go the whole distance with the
+same horses. Paris is left by the Boulevard de la Bastille, the Barrière
+du Trône, and the chateau and woods of Vincennes. The second time I went
+into Brie, it was with the General himself, and in his own carriage. He
+showed me a small pavilion that is still standing in a garden near the
+old site of the Bastille, and which he told me, once belonged to the
+hotel that Beaumarchais inhabited, when in his glory, and in which
+pavilion this witty writer was accustomed to work. The roof was topped
+by a vane to show which way the wind blew; and, in pure _fanfaronnade_,
+or to manifest his contempt for principles, the author of "Figaro" had
+caused a large copper pen to do the duty of a weathercock; and there it
+stands to this day, a curious memorial equally of his wit and of his
+audacity.
+
+At the Barrière du Trône the General pointed out to me the spot where
+two of his female connexions suffered under the guillotine during the
+Reign of Terror. On one occasion, in passing, we entered the Castle of
+Vincennes, which is a sort of citadel for Paris, and which has served
+for a state prison since the destruction of the Bastille. Almost all of
+these strong old places were formerly the residences of the kings, or of
+great nobles, the times requiring that they should live constantly
+protected by ditches and walls.
+
+Vincennes, like the Tower of London, is a collection of old buildings,
+enclosed within a wall, and surrounded by a ditch. The latter, however,
+is dry. The most curious of the structures, and the one which gives the
+place its picturesque appearance, in the distance, is a cluster of
+exceedingly slender, tall, round towers, in which the prisoners are
+usually confined, and which is the _donjon_ of the hold. This building,
+which contains many vaulted rooms piled on each other, was formerly the
+royal abode; and it has, even now, a ditch of its own, though it stands
+within the outer walls of the place. There are many other high towers on
+the walls; and, until the reign of Napoleon, there were still more; but
+he caused them to be razed to the level of the walls, which of
+themselves are sufficiently high.
+
+The chapel is a fine building, being Gothic. It was constructed in the
+time of Charles V. There are also two or three vast _corps de bâtimens_,
+which are almost palaces in extent and design, though they are now used
+only as quarters for officers, etc. etc. The _donjon_ dates from the
+same reign. The first room in this building is called the "salle de la
+question," a name which sufficiently denotes its infernal use. That of
+the upper story is the room in which the kings of France formerly held
+their councils. The walls are sixteen feet thick, and the rooms are
+thirty feet high. As there are five stories, this _donjon_ cannot be
+less than a hundred and forty or fifty feet in elevation. The view from
+the summit is very extensive; though it is said that, in the time of
+Napoleon, a screen was built around the battlement, to prevent the
+prisoners, when they took the air, from enjoying it. As this conqueror
+was cruel from policy alone, it is probable this was merely a precaution
+against signals; for it is quite apparent, if he desired, to torment his
+captives, France has places better adapted to the object than even the
+_donjon_ of Vincennes. I am not his apologist, however; for, while I
+shall not go quite as far as the Englishman who maintained, in a
+laboured treatise, that Napoleon was the beast of the Revelations, I
+believe he was anything but a god.
+
+Vincennes was a favourite residence of St. Louis, and there is a
+tradition that he used to take his seat under a particular oak, in the
+adjoining forest, where, all who pleased were permitted to come before
+him, and receive justice from himself. Henry V. of England, died in the
+_donjon_ of Vincennes; and I believe his successor, Henry VI. was born
+in the same building. One gets a better notion of the state of things in
+the ages of feudality, by passing an hour in examining such a hold, than
+in a week's reading. After going through this habitation, and studying
+its barbarous magnificence, I feel much more disposed to believe that
+Shakspeare has not outraged probability in his dialogue between Henry
+and Catharine, than if I had never seen it, bad as that celebrated
+love-scene is.
+
+Shortly after quitting Vincennes the road crosses the Marne, and
+stretches away across a broad bottom. There is little of interest
+between Paris and Rosay. The principal house is that of Grosbois, which
+once belonged to Moreau, I believe, but is now the property of the
+Prince de Wagram, the young son of Berthier. The grounds are extensive,
+and the house is large, though I think neither in very good taste, at
+least, so far as one could judge in passing.
+
+There are two or three ruins on this road of some historical interest,
+but not of much beauty. There is usually a nakedness, unrelieved by
+trees or other picturesque accessories, about the French ruins, which
+robs them of half their beauty, and dirty, squalid hamlets and villages
+half the time come in to render the picture still less interesting.
+
+At Rosay another route is taken, and Lagrange is approached by the rear,
+after turning a small bit of wood. It is possible to see the tops of the
+towers for an instant, on the great road, before reaching the town.
+
+It is not certainly known in what age the chateau was built; but, from
+its form, and a few facts connected with its origin, whose dates are
+ascertained, it is thought to be about five hundred years old. It never
+was more than a second-rate building of its class, though it was clearly
+intended for a baronial hold. Originally, the name was Lagrange en Brie;
+but by passing into a new family, it got the appellation of Lagrange
+Bléneau, by which it is known at present. You are sufficiently familiar
+with French to understand that _grange_ means barn or granary, and that
+a liberal translation would make it Bléneau Farm.
+
+In 1399 a marriage took place between the son of the lord of Lagrange en
+Brie with a daughter of a branch of the very ancient and great family of
+Courtenay, which had extensive possessions, at that time, in Brie. It
+was this marriage which gave the new name to the castle, the estate in
+consequence passing into the line of Courtenay-Bléneau. In 1595, the
+property, by another marriage with an heiress, passed into the
+well-known family D'Aubussons, Comtes de la Feuillade. The first
+proprietor of this name was the grandfather of the Mareschal de la
+Feuillade, the courtier who caused the Place des Victoires to be
+constructed at Paris; and he appropriated the revenues of the estate,
+which, in 1686, were valued at nine thousand francs, to the support and
+completion of his work of flattery. The property at that time was,
+however, much more extensive than it is at present. The son of this
+courtier dying without issue, in 1726, the estate was purchased by M.
+Dupré, one of the judges of France.
+
+With this magistrate commences, I believe, the connexion of the
+ancestors of the Lafayettes with the property. The only daughter married
+M. d'Aguesseau; and her daughter, again, married the Duc de
+Noailles-d'Ayen, [29] carrying with her, as a marriage portion, the lands
+of Fontenay, Lagrange, etc. etc., or, in other words, the ancient
+possessions of M. de Lafeuillade. The Marquis de Lafayette married one
+of the Mesdemoiselles de Noailles, while he was still a youth, and when
+the estate, after a short sequestration, was restored to the family,
+General Lafayette received the chateau of Lagrange, with some six or
+eight hundred acres of land around it, as his wife's portion.
+
+[Footnote 29: Mr. Adams, in his Eulogy on Lafayette, has called the Duc
+de Noailles, the first peer of France. The fact is of no great moment,
+but accuracy is always better than error. I believe the Duc de Noailles
+was the youngest of the old _ducs et pairs_ of France. The Duc d'Uzès, I
+have always understood, was the oldest.]
+
+Although the house is not very spacious for a chateau of the region in
+which it stands, it is a considerable edifice, and one of the most
+picturesque I have seen in this country. The buildings stand on three
+sides of an irregular square. The fourth side must have been either a
+high wall or a range of low offices formerly, to complete the court and
+the defences, but every vestige of them has long since been removed. The
+ditch, too, which originally encircled the whole castle, has been filled
+in, on two sides, though still remaining on the two others, and greatly
+contributing to the beauty of the place, as the water is living, and is
+made to serve the purposes of a fishpond. We had carp from it, for
+breakfast, the day after our arrival.
+
+Lagrange is constructed of hewn stone, of a good greyish colour, and in
+parts of it there are some respectable pretensions to architecture. I
+think it probable that one of its fronts has been rebuilt, the style
+being so much better than the rest of the structure. There are five
+towers, all of which are round, and have the plain, high, pyramidal
+roof, so common in France. They are without cornices, battlements of any
+sort, or, indeed, any relief to the circular masonry. One, however, has
+a roof of a square form, though the exterior of the lower itself is, at
+least in part, round. All the roofs are of slate.
+
+The approach to the castle is circuitous, until quite near it, when the
+road enters a little thicket of evergreens, crosses a bridge, and passes
+beneath an arch to the court, which is paved. The bridge is now
+permanent, though there was once a draw, and the grooves of a portcullis
+are still visible beneath the arch. The shortest side of the square is
+next the bridge, the building offering here but little more than the two
+towers, and the room above the gateway. One of these towers forms the
+end of this front of the castle, and the other is, of course, at an
+angle. On the exterior, they are both buried in ivy, as well as the
+building which connects them. This ivy was planted by Charles Fox, who,
+in company with General Fitzpatrick, visited Lagrange, after the peace
+of Amiens. The windows, which are small and irregular on this side, open
+beautifully through the thick foliage, and as this is the part of the
+structure that is occupied by the children of the family, their blooming
+faces thrust through the leafy apertures have a singularly pleasing
+effect. The other three towers stand, one near the centre of the
+principal _corps de bâtiment_, one at the other angle, and the third at
+the end of the wing opposite that of the gate. The towers vary in size,
+and are all more or less buried in the walls, though still so distinct
+as greatly to relieve the latter, and everywhere to rise above them. On
+the open side of the court there is no ditch, but the ground, which is
+altogether park-like, and beautifully arranged, falls away, dotted with
+trees and copses, towards a distant thicket.
+
+Besides the _rez-de-chaussée_, which is but little above the ground,
+there are two good stories all round the building, and even more in the
+towers. The dining-room and offices are below, and there is also a small
+oratory, or chapel, though I believe none of the family live there. The
+entrance to the principal apartments is opposite the gate, and there is
+also here an exterior door which communicates directly with the lawn,
+the ditch running behind the other wing, and in front of the gate only.
+The great staircase is quite good, being spacious, easy of ascent, and
+of marble, with a handsome iron railing. It was put there by the mother
+of Madame Lafayette, I believe, and the General told me, it was nearly
+the only thing of value that he found among the fixtures, on taking
+possession. It had escaped injury.
+
+I should think the length of the house on the side of the square which
+contains the staircase might be ninety feet, including the tower at the
+end, and the tower at the angle; and perhaps the side which contains the
+offices may be even a little longer; though this will also include the
+same tower in the same angle, as well as the one at the opposite corner;
+while the side in which is the gateway can scarcely exceed sixty feet.
+If my estimates, which are merely made by the eye, are correct,
+including the towers, this would give an outside wall of two hundred and
+fifty feet, in circuit. Like most French buildings, the depth is
+comparatively much less. I question if the outer drawing-room is more
+than eighteen feet wide, though it is near thirty long. This room has
+windows on the court and on the lawn, and is the first apartment one
+enters after ascending the stairs. It communicates with the inner
+drawing-room, which is in the end tower of this side of the chateau, is
+quite round, of course, and may be twenty feet in diameter.
+
+The General's apartments are on the second floor. They consist of his
+bed-room, a large cabinet, and the library. The latter is in the tower
+at the angle, on the side of the staircase. It is circular, and from its
+windows overlooks the moat, which is beautifully shaded by willows and
+other trees. It contains a respectable collection of books, besides
+divers curiosities.
+
+The only bed-rooms I have occupied are, one in the tower, immediately
+beneath the library, and the other in the side tower, or the only one
+which does not stand at an angle, or at an end of the building. I
+believe, however, that the entire edifice, with the exception of the
+oratory, the offices, the dining-room, which is a large apartment on the
+_rez-de-chaussée_, the two drawing-rooms, two or three cabinets, and the
+library, and perhaps a family-room or two, such as a school-room,
+painting-room, etc., is subdivided into sleeping apartments, with the
+necessary cabinets and dressing-rooms. Including the family, I have
+known thirty people to be lodged in the house, besides servants, and I
+should think it might even lodge more. Indeed its hospitality seems to
+know no limits, for every newcomer appears to be just as welcome as all
+the others.
+
+The cabinet of Lafayette communicates with the library, and I passed
+much of the time during our visit, alone with him, in these two rooms. I
+may say that this was the commencement of a confidence with which he has
+since continued to treat me, and of a more intimate knowledge of the
+amiable features and simple integrity of his character, that has greatly
+added to my respect. No one can be pleasanter in private, and he is full
+of historical anecdotes, that he tells with great simplicity, and
+frequently with great humour. The cabinet contains many portraits, and,
+among others, one of Madame de Staël, and one of his own father. The
+former I am assured is exceedingly like; it is not the resemblance of a
+very fascinating woman. In the latter I find more resemblance to some of
+the grandchildren than to the son, although there is something about the
+shape of the head that is not unlike that of Lafayette's.
+
+General Lafayette never knew his father, who was killed, when he was
+quite an infant, at the battle of Minden. I believe the general was an
+only child, for I have never heard him speak of any brother or sister,
+nor indeed of any relative at all, as I can remember, on his own side,
+though he often alludes to the connexions he made by his marriage. I
+asked him how his father happened to be styled the _Comte_ de Lafayette,
+and he to be called the _Marquis_. He could not tell me: his grandfather
+was the _Marquis_ de Lafayette, his father the _Comte_, and he again was
+termed the _Marquis_. "I know very little about it," said be, "beyond
+this: I found myself a little _Marquis_, as I grew to know anything, and
+boys trouble themselves very little about such matters; and then I soon
+got tired of the name after I went to America. I cannot explain all the
+foolish distinctions of the feudal times, but I very well remember that
+when I was quite a boy, I had the honour to go through the ceremony of
+appointing the _curé_ of a very considerable town in Auvergne, of which
+I was the Seigneur. My conscience has been quite easy about the
+nomination, however, as my guardians must answer for the sin, if there
+be any."
+
+I was at a small dinner given by the Comte de Ségur, just before we went
+to Lagrange, and at which General Lafayette and M. Alexander de Lameth
+were also guests. The three had served in America, all of them having
+been colonels while little more than boys. In the course of the
+conversation, M. de Lameth jokingly observed that the Americans paid the
+greater deference to General Lafayette because he was a _Marquis_. For a
+long time there had been but one Marquis in England (Lord Rockingham),
+and the colonist appreciating all other Marquises by this standard, had
+at once thought they would do no less than make the Marquis de Lafayette
+a general. "As for myself, though I was the senior colonel, and (as I
+understood him to say) his superior in personal rank, I passed for
+nobody, because I was only a _chevalier._" This sally was laughed at, at
+the time, though there is something very unsettled in the use of those
+arbitrary personal distinctions on which the French formerly laid so
+much stress. I shall not attempt to explain them. I contented myself by
+whispering to M. de Lameth, that we certainly knew very little of such
+matters in America, but I questioned if we were ever so ignorant as to
+suppose there was only one _Marquis_ in France. On the contrary, we are
+little too apt to fancy every Frenchman a _Marquis_.
+
+There was formerly a regular parish church attached to the chateau,
+which is still standing. It is very small, and is within a short
+distance of the gateway. The congregation was composed solely of the
+inhabitants of the chateau, and the people of the farm. The church
+contains epitaphs and inscriptions in memory of three of the D'Aubussons
+whose hearts were buried here, viz. Leon, Comte de Lafeuillade, a
+lieutenant-general; Gabriel, Marquis de Montargis; and Paul D'Aubussons,
+a Knight of Malta; all of whom were killed young, in battle.
+
+The General has about three hundred and fifty acres in cultivation, and
+more than two in wood, pasture, and meadow. The place is in very
+excellent condition, and seems to be well attended to. I have galloped
+all over it, on a little filly belonging to one of the young gentlemen,
+and have found beauty and utility as nicely blended, as is often to be
+met with, even in England, the true country of _fermes ornées_, though
+the name is imported.
+
+The third day of our visit, we all drove three or four leagues across
+the country, to see an old ruin of a royal castle called Vivier. This
+name implies a pond, and sure enough we found the remains of the
+buildings in the midst of two or three pools of water. This has been a
+considerable house, the ruins being still quite extensive and rather
+pretty. It was originally the property of a great noble, but the kings
+of France were in possession of it, as early as the year 1300. Charles
+V. had a great affection for Vivier, and very materially increased its
+establishment. His son, Charles VI. who was at times deranged, was often
+confined here, and it was after his reign, and by means of the long wars
+that ravaged France, that the place came to be finally abandoned as a
+royal abode. Indeed, it is not easy to see why a king should ever have
+chosen this spot at all for his residence, unless it might be for the
+purpose of hunting, for even now it is in a retired, tame, and far from
+pleasant part of the country.
+
+There are the ruins of a fine chapel and of two towers of considerable
+interest, beside extensive fragments of more vulgar buildings. One of
+these towers, being very high and very slender, is a striking object;
+but, from its form and position, it was one of those narrow wells that
+were attached to larger towers, and which contained nothing but the
+stairs. They are commonly to be seen in the ruins of edifices built in
+the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, in France; and what is worthy
+of remark, in several instances, notwithstanding their slender forms, I
+have met with them standing, although their principals have nearly
+disappeared. I can only account for it, by supposing that their use and
+delicacy of form have required more than ordinary care in the
+construction.
+
+The ruins of Vivier belong to M. Parquin, a distinguished lawyer of
+Paris. This gentleman has a small country-house near by, and General
+Lafayette took us all to see him. We found him at home, and met, quite
+as a matter of course, with a polite reception. M. Parquin gave us much
+curious information about the ruin, and took us to see some of the
+subterraneous passages that he has caused to be opened.
+
+It is thought that some of these artificial caverns were prisons, and
+that others were intended merely as places for depositing stores. The
+one we entered was of beautiful masonry, vaulted with the nicest art,
+and seemed to communicate with the ruins although the outlet was in the
+open field, and some distance from the walls. It might have been
+intended for the double purpose of a store-house and an outlet; for it
+is rare to meet with a palace, or a castle, that has out, more or less,
+of these private means of entrance and retreat. The Tuileries is said to
+abound with them, and I have been shown the line of an under-ground
+passage, between that palace and one of the public hotels, which must be
+fully a quarter of a mile in length.
+
+Dulaure gives an extract from a report of the state of the Chateau of
+Vivier, made about the year 1700, with a view to know whether its
+conditions were such as to entitle the place to preserve certain of its
+privileges. In this document, the castle is described as standing in the
+centre of a marsh, surrounded by forest, and as so remote from all
+civilization, as to be nearly forgotten. This, it will be remembered, is
+the account of a royal abode, that stands within thirty miles of Paris.
+
+In the very heart of the French capital, are the remains of an extensive
+palace of one of the Roman Emperors, and yet it may be questioned if one
+in a thousand, of those who live within a mile of the spot, have the
+least idea of the origin of the buildings. I have inquired about it, in
+its immediate neighbourhood, and it was with considerable difficulty I
+could discover any one who even knew that there was such a ruin at all,
+in the street. The great number of similar objects, and the habit of
+seeing them daily, has some such effect on one, as the movement of a
+crowd in a public thoroughfare, where images pass so incessantly before
+the eye, as to leave no impression of their peculiarities. Were a
+solitary bison to scamper through the Rue St. Honoré, the worthy
+Parisians would transmit an account of his exploits to their children's
+children, while the wayfarer on the prairies takes little heed of the
+flight of a herd.
+
+As we went to Lagrange, we stopped at a tavern, opposite to which was
+the iron gate of a small chateau. I asked the girl who was preparing our
+_goûter_, to whom the house belonged. "I am sorry I cannot tell you,
+sir," she answered; and then seeing suspicion in my face, she promptly
+added--"for, do you see, sir, I have only been here _six weeks_." Figure
+to yourself an American girl, set down opposite an iron gate, in the
+country, and how long do you imagine she would be ignorant of the
+owner's name? If the blood of those pious inquisitors, the puritans,
+were in her veins, she would know more, not only of the gate, but of its
+owner, his wife, his children, his means, his hopes, wishes, intentions
+and thoughts, than he ever knew himself, or would be likely to know. But
+if this prominent love of meddling must of necessity in its very nature
+lead to what is worse than contented ignorance, gossiping error, and a
+wrong estimate of our fellow-creatures, it has, at least, the advantage
+of keeping a people from falling asleep over their everyday facts. There
+is no question that the vulgar and low-bred propensity of conjecturing,
+meddling, combining, with their unavoidable companion, _inventing_,
+exist to a vice, among a portion of our people; but, on the other hand,
+it is extremely inconvenient when one is travelling, and wishes to know
+the points of the compass, as has happened to myself, if he should ask a
+full-grown woman whereabouts the sun rises in that neighbourhood, he is
+repulsed with the answer, that--"Monsieur ought to know that better than
+a poor garden-woman like me!"
+
+We returned to Paris, after a pleasant visit of three days at Lagrange,
+during which we had delightful weather, and altogether a most agreeable
+time. The habits of the family are very regular and simple, but the
+intercourse has the freedom and independence of a country-house. We were
+all in the circular drawing-room a little before ten, breakfast being
+served between ten and eleven. The table was French, the morning repast
+consisting of light dishes of meat, _compotes_, fruits, and sometimes
+_soupe au lait_, one of the simplest and best things for such a meal
+than can be imagined. As a compliment to us Americans, we had fish fried
+and broiled, but I rather think this was an innovation. Wine, to drink
+with water, as a matter of course, was on the table. The whole ended
+with a cup of _café au lait_. The morning then passed as each one saw
+fit. The young men went shooting, the ladies drove out, or read, or had
+a little music, while the general and myself were either walking about
+the farm, or were conversing in the library. We dined at six, as at
+Paris, and tea was made in the drawing-room about nine.
+
+I was glad to hear from General Lafayette, that the reports of Americans
+making demands on his purse, like so many other silly rumours that are
+circulated, merely because some one has fancied such a thing might be
+so, are untrue. On the contrary, he assures me that applications of this
+nature are very seldom made, and most of those that have been made have
+proved to come from Englishmen, who have thought they might swindle him
+in this form. I have had at least a dozen such applications myself, but
+I take it nothing is easier, in general, than to distinguish between an
+American and a native of Great Britain. It was agreed between us, that
+in future all applications of this nature should be sent to me for
+investigation.[30]
+
+[Footnote 30: Under this arrangement, two or three years later, an
+applicant was sent for examination, under very peculiar circumstances.
+The man represented himself to be a shopkeeper of Baltimore, who had
+come to England with his wife and child, to purchase goods. He had been
+robbed of all he had, according to his account of the matter, about a
+thousand pounds in sovereigns, and was reduced to want, in a strange
+country. After trying all other means in vain, he bethought him of
+coming to Paris, to apply to General Lafayette for succour. He had just
+money enough to do this, having left his wife in Liverpool. He appeared
+with an English passport, looked like an Englishman, and had even caught
+some of the low English idioms, such as, "I am agreeable," for "It is
+agreeable to me," or, "I agree to do so," etc. etc. The writer was
+exceedingly puzzled to decide as to this man's nationality. At length,
+in describing his journey to Paris, he said, "they took my passport from
+me, when we got _to the lines_." This settled the matter, as no one but
+an American would call a _frontier_ the _lines_. He proved, in the end,
+to be an American, and a great rogue.]
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XXI.
+
+Insecurity of the Bourbons.--Distrust of Americans.--Literary Visitor.
+--The Templars.--Presents and Invitations.--A Spy--American Virtue.
+--Inconsistency.--Social Freedom in America,--French Mannerists
+--National Distinctions.--A lively Reaction.
+
+
+To R. COOPER, ESQ. COOPERSTOWN.
+
+We all went to bed, a night or two since, as usual, and awoke to learn
+that there had been a fight in the capital. One of the countless
+underplots had got so near the surface, that it threw up smoke. It is
+said, that about fifty were killed and wounded, chiefly on the part of
+the populace.
+
+The insecurity of the Bourbons is little understood in America. It is
+little understood even by those Americans who pass a few months in the
+country, and in virtue of frequenting the _cafés_, and visiting the
+theatres, fancy they know the people. Louis XVIII. was more than once on
+the point of flying, again, between the year 1815 and his death; for
+since the removal of the allied troops, there is really no force for a
+monarch to depend on, more especially in and around the capital, the
+army being quite as likely to take sides against them as for them.
+
+The government has determined on exhibiting vigour, and there was a
+great show of troops the night succeeding the combat. Curious to see the
+effect of all this, two or three of us got into a carriage and drove
+through the streets, about nine o'clock. We found some two or three
+thousand men on the Boulevards, and the Rue St. Denis, in particular,
+which had been the scene of the late disorder, was watched with jealous
+caution. In all, there might have been four or five thousand men under
+arms. They were merely in readiness, leaving a free passage for
+carriages, though in some of the narrow streets we found the bayonets
+pretty near our faces.
+
+An American being supposed _ex officio_, as it were, to be a well-wisher
+to the popular cause, there is, perhaps, a slight disposition to look at
+us with distrust. The opinion of our _travellers'_ generally favouring
+liberty is, in my judgment, singularly erroneous, the feelings of a
+majority being, on the whole, just the other way, for, at least, the
+first year or two of their European experience; though, I think, it is
+to be noticed, by the end of that time, that they begin to lose sight of
+the personal interests which, at home, have made them anything but
+philosophers on such subjects, and to see and appreciate the immense
+advantages of freedom over exclusion, although the predominance of the
+former may not always favour their own particular views. Such, at least,
+has been the result of my own observations, and so far from considering
+a fresh arrival from home, as being likely to be an accession to our
+little circle of liberal principles, I have generally deemed all such
+individuals as being more likely to join the side of the aristocrats or
+the exclusionists in politics. This is not the moment to enter into an
+examination of the causes that have led to so singular a contradiction
+between opinions and facts, though I think the circumstance is not to be
+denied, for it is now my intention to give you an account of the manner
+in which matters are managed here, rather than enter into long
+investigations of the state of society at home.
+
+Not long after my arrival in France, a visit was announced, from a
+person who was entirely unknown to me, but who called himself a
+_littérateur_. The first interview passed off as such interviews usually
+do, and circumstances not requiring any return on my part, it was soon
+forgotten. Within a fortnight, however, I received visit the second,
+when the conversation took a political turn, my guest freely abusing the
+Bourbons, the aristocrats, and the present state of things in France. I
+did little more than listen. When the way was thus opened, I was asked
+if I admired Sir Walter Scott, and particularly what I thought of
+Ivanhoe, or, rather, if I did not think it an indifferent book. A little
+surprised at such a question, I told my _littérateur_, that Ivanhoe
+appeared to me to be very unequal, the first half being incomparably the
+best, but that, as a whole, I thought it stood quite at the head of the
+particular sort of romances to which it belonged. The Antiquary, and Guy
+Mannering, for instance, were both much nearer perfection, and, on the
+whole, I thought both better books; but Ivanhoe, especially its
+commencement, was a noble poem. But did I not condemn the want of
+historical truth in its pictures? I did not consider Ivanhoe as intended
+to be history; it was a work of the imagination, in which all the
+fidelity that was requisite, was enough to be probable and natural, and
+that requisite I thought it possessed in an eminent degree. It is true,
+antiquarians accused the author of having committed some anachronisms,
+by confounding the usages of different centuries, which was perhaps a
+greater fault, in such a work, than to confound mere individual
+characters; but of this I did not pretend to judge, not being the least
+of an antiquary myself. Did I not think he had done gross injustice to
+the noble and useful order of the Templars? On this point I could say no
+more than on the preceding, having but a very superficial knowledge of
+the Templars, though I thought the probabilities seemed to be perfectly
+well respected. Nothing could _seem_ to be more true, than Scott's
+pictures. My guest then went into a long vindication of the Templars,
+stating Scott had done them gross injustice, and concluding with an
+exaggerated compliment, in which it was attempted to persuade me that I
+was the man to vindicate the truth, and to do justice to at subject that
+was so peculiarly connected with liberal principles. I disclaimed the
+ability to undertake such a task, at all; confessed that I did not wish
+to disturb the images which Sir Walter Scott had left, had I the
+ability; and declared I did not see the connexion between his
+accusation, admitting it to be true, and liberal principles.
+
+My visitor soon after went away, and I saw no more of him for a week,
+when he came again. On this occasion, he commenced by relating several
+_piquant_ anecdotes of the Bourbons and their friends, gradually and
+ingeniously leading the conversation, again, round to his favourite
+Templars. After pushing me, for half an hour, on this point, always
+insisting on my being the man to vindicate the order, and harping on its
+connexion with liberty, he took advantage of one of my often-repeated
+protestations of ignorance of the whole matter, suddenly to say, "Well,
+then, Monsieur, go and see for yourself, and you will soon be satisfied
+that my account of the order is true." "Go and see what?" "The
+Templars." "There are no longer any." "They exist still." "Where?"
+"Here, in Paris." "This is new to me: I do not understand it." "The
+Templars exist; they possess documents to prove how much Scott has
+misrepresented them, and--but, you will remember that the actual
+government has so much jealousy of everything it does not control, that
+secrecy is necessary--and, to be frank with you, M. ----, I am
+commissioned by the Grand Master, to invite you to be present at a
+secret meeting, this very week."
+
+Of course, I immediately conjectured that some of the political
+agitators of the day had assumed this taking guise, in order to combine
+their means, and carry out their plans.[31] The proposition was gotten
+rid of, by my stating, in terms that could not be misunderstood, that I
+was a traveller, and did not wish to meddle with anything that required
+secrecy, in a foreign government; that I certainly had my own political
+notions, and if pushed, should not hesitate to avow them anywhere; that
+the proper place for a writer to declare his sentiments, was in his
+books, unless under circumstances which authorized him to act; that I
+did not conceive foreigners were justifiable in going beyond this; that
+I never had meddled with the affairs of foreign countries, and that I
+never would; and that the fact of this society's being secret, was
+sufficient to deter me from visiting it. With this answer, my guest
+departed, and he never came again.
+
+[Footnote 31: Since the revolution of 1830, these Templars have made
+public, but abortive efforts, to bring themselves into notice, by
+instituting some ceremonies, in which they appeared openly in their
+robes.]
+
+Now, the first impression was, as I have told you, and I supposed my
+visitor, although a man of fifty, was one of those who innocently lent
+himself to these silly exaggerations; either as a dupe, or to dupe
+others. I saw reason, however, to change this opinion.
+
+At the time these visits occurred, I scarcely knew any one in Paris, and
+was living in absolute retirement--being, as you know already, quite
+without letters. About ten days after I saw the last of my
+_littérateur_, I got a letter from a high functionary of the government,
+sending me a set of valuable medals. The following day these were
+succeeded by his card, and an invitation to dinner. Soon after, another
+person, notoriously connected with court intrigues, sought me out, and
+overwhelmed me with civilities. In a conversation that shortly after
+occurred between us, this person gave a pretty direct intimation, that
+by pushing a little, a certain decoration that is usually conferred on
+literary men was to be had, if it were desired. I got rid of all these
+things, in the straight-forward manner, that is the best for upsetting
+intrigues; and having really nothing to conceal, I was shortly permitted
+to take my own course.
+
+I have now little doubt that the _littérateur_ was a _spy_, sent either
+to sound me on some points connected with Lafayette and the republicans,
+or possibly to lead me into some difficulty, though I admit that this is
+no more than conjecture. I give you the facts, which, at the time,
+struck me as, at least, odd, and you may draw your own conclusions.
+This, however, is but one of a dozen adventures, more or less similar,
+that have occurred, and I think it well to mention it, by way of giving
+you an insight into what sometimes happens here.[32]
+
+[Footnote 32: A conversation, which took place after the revolution of
+1830, with one of the parties named, leaves little doubt as to the truth
+of the original conjecture.]
+
+My rule has been, whenever I am pushed on the subject of politics, to
+deal honestly and sincerely with all with whom I am brought in contact,
+and in no manner to leave the impression, that I think the popular form
+of government an unavoidable evil, to which America is obliged to
+submit. I do not shut my eyes to the defects of our own system, or to
+the bad consequences that flow from it, and from it alone; but, the more
+I see of other countries, the more I am persuaded, that, under
+circumstances which admit but of a choice of evils, we are greatly the
+gainers by having adopted it. Although I do not believe every other
+nation is precisely fitted to imitate us, I think it is their misfortune
+they are not so. If the inhabitants of other countries do not like to
+hear such opinions, they should avoid the subject with Americans.
+
+It is very much the custom here, whenever the example of America is
+quoted in favour of the practicability of republican institutions, to
+attribute our success to the fact of society's being so simple, and the
+people so virtuous. I presume I speak within bounds, when I say that I
+have heard the latter argument urged a hundred times, during the last
+eighteen months. One lady, in particular, who is exceedingly clever, but
+who has a dread of all republics, on account of having lost a near
+friend during the reign of terror, was especially in the practice of
+resorting to this argument, whenever, in our frequent playful
+discussions of the subject, I have succeeded in disturbing her
+inferences, by citing American facts. "Mais, Monsieur, l'Amérique est si
+jeune, et vous avez les vertus que nous manquons," etc. etc. has always
+been thought a sufficient answer. Now I happen to be one of those who do
+not entertain such extravagant notions of the exclusive and peculiar
+virtues of our own country. Nor have I been so much struck with the
+profound respect of the Europeans, in general, for those very qualities
+that, nevertheless, are always quoted as the reason of the success of
+what is called the "American experiment." Quite the contrary: I have
+found myself called on, more than once, to repel accusations against our
+morality of a very serious nature; accusations that we do not deserve;
+and my impression certainly is, that the American people, so far as they
+are at all the subjects of observation, enjoy anything but a good name,
+in Europe. Struck by this flagrant contradiction, I determined to
+practise on my female friend, a little; a plan that was successfully
+carried out, as follows.
+
+Avoiding all allusion to politics, so as to throw her completely off her
+guard, I took care to introduce such subjects as should provoke
+comparisons on other points, between France and America; or rather,
+between the latter and Europe generally. As our discussions had a tinge
+of philosophy, neither being very bigoted, and both preserving perfect
+good humour, the plot succeeded admirably. After a little time, I took
+occasion to fortify one of my arguments by a slight allusion to the
+peculiar virtues of the American people. She was too well-bred to
+controvert this sort of reasoning at first, until, pushing the point,
+little by little, she was so far provoked as to exclaim, "You lay great
+stress on the exclusive virtues of your countrymen, Monsieur, but I have
+yet to learn that they are so much better than the rest of the world!"
+"I beg a thousand pardons, Madame, if I have been led into an
+indiscretion on this delicate subject; but you must ascribe my error to
+your own eloquence, which, contrary to my previous convictions, had
+persuaded me into the belief that we have some peculiar unction of this
+nature, that is unknown in Europe. I now begin to see the mistake, and
+to understand "que nous autres Américains" are to be considered
+_virtuous_ only where there is question of the practicability of
+maintaining republican form of government, and as great rogues on all
+other occasions." Madame de ---- was wise enough, and good-tempered
+enough, to laugh at the artifice, and the allusion to "nous autres
+vertueux" has got to be a _mot d'ordre_ with us. The truth is, that the
+question of politics is exclusively one of personal advantages, with a
+vast majority of the people of Europe; one set selfishly struggling to
+maintain their present superiority, while the other is as selfishly, and
+in some respects as blindly, striving to overturn all that is
+established, in order to be benefited by the scramble that will follow;
+and religion, justice, philosophy, and practical good are almost equally
+remote from the motives of both parties.
+
+From reflecting on such subjects, I have been led into a consideration
+of the influence of political institutions on the more ordinary
+relations of society. If the conclusions are generally in favour of
+popular rights, and what is called freedom, there can be little question
+that there are one or two weak spots, on our side of the question, that
+it were better did they not exist. Let us, for the humour of the thing,
+look a little into these points.
+
+It is a common remark of all foreigners, that there is less social
+freedom in America than in most other countries of Christendom. By
+social freedom, I do not mean as relates to the mere forms of society,
+for in these we are loose rather than rigid; but that one is less a
+master of his own acts, his own mode of living, his own time, being more
+rigidly amenable to public opinion, on all these points, than elsewhere.
+The fact, I believe, out of all question, is true; at least it appears
+to be true, so far as my knowledge of our own and of other countries
+extends. Admitting then the fact to be so, it is worth while to throw
+away a moment in inquiring into the consequent good and evil of such a
+state of things, as well as in looking for the causes. It is always a
+great assistant in our study of others, to have some tolerable notions
+of ourselves.
+
+The control of public opinion has, beyond question, a salutary influence
+on the moral _exterior_ of a country. The great indifference which the
+French, and indeed the higher classes of most European countries,
+manifest to the manner of living of the members of their different
+circles, so long as certain appearances are respected, may do no
+affirmative good to society, though at the same time it does less
+positive harm than you may be disposed to imagine. But this is not the
+point to which I now allude. Europeans maintain that, in things
+_innocent in themselves_, but which are closely connected with the
+independence of action and tastes of men, the American is less his own
+master than the inhabitant of this part of the world; and this is the
+fact I, for one, feel it necessary to concede to them. There can be no
+doubt that society meddles much more with the private affairs of
+individuals, and affairs, too, over which it properly has no control, in
+America than in Europe. I will illustrate what I mean, by an example.
+
+About twenty years since there lived in one of our shiretowns a family,
+which, in its different branches, had numerous female descendants, then
+all children. A member of this family, one day, went to a respectable
+clergyman, his friend, and told him that he and his connexions had so
+many female children, whom it was time to think of educating, that they
+had hit upon the plan of engaging some suitable instructress, with the
+intention of educating their girls all together, both for economy's sake
+and for convenience, as well as that such near connexions might be
+brought up in a way to strengthen the family tie. The clergyman warmly
+remonstrated against the scheme, assuring his friend, _that the
+community would not bear it, and that it would infallibly make enemies!_
+This was the feeling of a very sensible man, and of an experienced
+divine, and I was myself the person making the application. This is
+religiously true, and I have often thought of the circumstance since,
+equally with astonishment and horror.
+
+There are doubtless many parts of America, even, where such an
+interference with the private arrangement of a family would not be
+dreamt of; but there is a large portion of the country in which the
+feeling described by my clerical friend does prevail. Most observers
+would refer all this to democracy, but I do not. The interference would
+not proceed from the humblest classes of society at all, but from those
+nearer one's own level. It would proceed from a determination to bring
+all within the jurisdiction of a common opinion, or to be revenged on
+delinquents, by envy, hatred, and all uncharitableness. There is no
+disposition in America, to let one live as he or she may happen to
+please to live; the public choosing, though always in its proper circle,
+to interfere and say _how_ you must live. It is folly to call this by
+terms as sounding as republicanism or democracy, which inculcate the
+doctrine of as much personal freedom as at all comports with the public
+good. He is, indeed, a most sneaking democrat, who finds it necessary to
+consult a neighbourhood before he can indulge his innocent habits and
+tastes. It is sheer _meddling_, and no casuistry can fitly give it any
+other name.
+
+A portion of this troublesome quality is owing, beyond question, to our
+provincial habits, which are always the most exacting; but I think a
+large portion, perhaps I ought to say the largest, is inherited from
+those pious but exaggerated religionists who first peopled the country.
+These sectaries extended the discipline of the church to all the
+concerns of life. Nothing was too minute to escape their cognizance, and
+a parish sat in judgment on the affairs of all who belonged to it. One
+may easily live so long in the condition of society that such an origin
+has entailed on us, as to be quite unconscious of its peculiarities, but
+I think they can hardly escape one who has lived much beyond its
+influence.
+
+Here, perhaps, the fault is to be found in the opposite extreme; though
+there are so many virtues consequent on independence of thought and
+independence of habits, that I am not sure the good does not equal the
+evil. There is no canting, and very little hypocrisy, in mere matters of
+habits, in France; and this, at once, is abridging two of our own most
+besetting vices. Still the French can hardly be called a very original
+people. Convention ties them down mercilessly in a great many things.
+They are less under the influence of mere fashion, in their intercourse,
+it is true, than some of their neighbours, reason and taste exercising
+more influence over such matters, in France, than almost anywhere else;
+but they are mannerists in the fine arts, in their literature, and in
+all their _feelings_, if one can use such an expression. The gross
+exaggerations of the romantic school that is, just now, attracting so
+much attention, are merely an effort to liberate themselves. But, after
+allowing for the extreme ignorance of the substratum of society, which,
+in France, although it forms so large a portion of the whole, should no
+more be taken into the account in speaking of the national qualities,
+than the slaves of Carolina should be included in an estimate of the
+character of the Carolinians, there is, notwithstanding this mannerism,
+a personal independence here, that certainly does not exist with us. The
+American goes and comes when he pleases, and no one asks for a passport;
+he has his political rights, talks of his liberty, swaggers of his
+advantages, and yet does less as he pleases, even in innocent things,
+than the Frenchman. His neighbours form a police, and a most troublesome
+and impertinent one it sometimes proves to be. It is also unjust, for
+having no legal means of arriving at facts, it half the time condemns on
+conjecture.
+
+The truth is, our institutions are the result of facts and accidents,
+and, being necessarily an imitative people, there are often gross
+inconsistencies between our professions and our practice; whereas the
+French have had to struggle through their apprenticeship in political
+rights, by the force of discussions and appeals to reason, and theory is
+still too important to be entirely overlooked. Perhaps no people
+understand the _true_ private characters of their public men so little
+as the Americans, or any people so well as the French. I have never
+known a distinguished American, in whom it did not appear to me that his
+popular character was a false one; or a distinguished Frenchman, whom
+the public did not appear to estimate very nearly as he deserved to be.
+Even Napoleon, necessary as he is to the national pride, and dazzling as
+is all military renown, seems to me to be much more justly appreciated
+at Paris than anywhere else. The practice of meddling can lead to no
+other result. They who wish to stand particularly fair before the
+public, resort to deception, and I have heard a man of considerable
+notoriety in America confess, that he was so much afraid of popular
+comments, that he always acted as if an enemy were looking over his
+shoulder. With us, no one scruples to believe that he knows all about a
+public man, even to the nicest traits of his character; all talk of him,
+as none should talk but those who are in his intimacy, and, what between
+hypocrisy on his part--an hypocrisy to which he is in some measure
+driven by the officious interference with his most private
+interests--and exaggerations and inventions, that ingenious tyrant,
+public opinion, comes as near the truth as a fortune-teller who is
+venturing his prediction in behalf of a stranger.[33]
+
+[Footnote 33: I can give no better illustration of the state of
+dependence to which men are reduced in America, by this spirit of
+meddling, than by the following anecdote: A friend was about to build a
+new town-house, and letting me know the situation, he asked my advice as
+to the mode of construction. The inconveniences of an ordinary American
+town-house were pointed out to him,--its unfitness for the general state
+of society, the climate, the other domestic arrangements, and its
+ugliness. All were admitted, and the plan proposed in place of the old
+style of building was liked, but still my friend hesitated about
+adopting it. "It will be a genteeler and a better-looking house than the
+other." "Agreed." "It will be really more convenient." "I think so,
+too." "It will be cheaper." "Of that there is no question." "Then why
+not adopt it?" "To own the truth, I _dare not build differently from my
+neighbour!_"]
+
+In France the right of the citizen to discuss all public matters is not
+only allowed, but _felt_. In America it is not _felt_, though it is
+allowed. A homage must be paid to the public, by assuming the disguise
+of acting as a public agent, in America; whereas, in France, individuals
+address their countrymen, daily, under their own signatures. The
+impersonality of _we_, and the character of public journalists, is
+almost indispensable, with us, to impunity, although the mask can
+deceive no one, the journalists notoriously making their prints
+subservient to their private passions and private interests, and being
+_impersonal_ only in the use of the imperial pronoun. The
+_representative_, too, in America, is privileged to teach, in virtue of
+his collective character, by the very men who hold the extreme and
+untenable doctrine of instruction! It is the fashion to say in America,
+_that the people will rule!_ it would be nearer the truth, however, to
+say, _the people will seem to rule_.
+
+I think that these distinctions are facts, and they certainly lead to
+odd reflections. We are so peculiarly situated as a nation, that one is
+not to venture on conclusions too hastily. A great deal is to be imputed
+to our provincial habits; much to the circumstance of the disproportion
+between surface and population, which, by scattering the well-bred and
+intelligent, a class at all times relatively small, serves greatly to
+lessen their influence in imparting tone to society; something to the
+inquisitorial habits of our pious forefathers, who appear to have
+thought that the charities were nought, and, in the very teeth of
+revelation, that Heaven was to be stormed by impertinences; while a good
+deal is to be conceded to the nature of a popular government whose
+essential spirit is to create a predominant opinion, before which, right
+or wrong, all must bow until its cycle shall be completed. Thus it is,
+that we are always, more or less, under one of two false influences, the
+blow or its rebound; action that is seldom quite right, or reaction that
+is always wrong; sinning heedlessly, or repeating to fanaticism. The
+surest process in the world, of "riding on to fortune" in America, is to
+get seated astride a lively "reaction," which is rather more likely to
+carry with it a unanimous sentiment, than even the error to which it
+owes its birth.
+
+As much of this weakness as is inseparable from humanity exists here,
+but it exists under so many modifying circumstances, as, in this
+particular, to render France as unlike America as well may be. Liberty
+is not always pure philosophy nor strict justice, and yet, as a whole,
+it is favourable to both. These are the spots on the political sun. To
+the eye which seeks only the radiance and warmth of the orb, they are
+lost; but he who studies it, with calmness and impartiality, sees them
+too plainly to be in any doubt of their existence.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XXII.
+
+Animal Magnetism.--Somnambules.--Magnetised Patients.--My own
+Examination.--A Prediction.--Ventriloquism.--Force of the Imagination.
+
+
+To JAMES E. DE KAY, M.D.
+
+Although we have not been without our metaphysical hallucinations in
+America, I do not remember to have heard that "animal magnetism" was
+ever in vogue among us. A people who are not very quick to feel the
+poetry of sentiment, may well be supposed exempt from the delusions of a
+doctrine which comprehends the very poetry of physics. Still, as the
+subject is not without interest, and as chance has put me in the way of
+personally inquiring into this fanciful system, I intend, in this
+letter, to give you an account of what I have both heard and seen.
+
+I shall premise by saying that I rank "animal magnetism" among the
+"arts" rather than among the "sciences." Of its theory I have no very
+clear notion, nor do I believe that I am at all peculiar in my
+ignorance; but until we can say what is that other "magnetism" to which
+the world is indisputably so much indebted for its knowledge and
+comforts, I do not know that we are to repudiate this, merely because we
+do not understand it. Magnetism is an unseen and inexplicable influence,
+and that is "metallic," while this is "animal;" _voilà tout_. On the
+whole, it may be fairly mooted which most controls the world, the animal
+or the metallic influence.
+
+To deal gravely with a subject that, at least, baffles our
+comprehension, there are certainly very extraordinary things related of
+animal magnetism, and apparently on pretty good testimony. Take, for
+instance, a single fact. M. Jules Cloquet is one of the cleverest
+practitioners of Paris, and is in extensive business. This gentleman
+publicly makes the following statement. I write it from memory, but have
+heard it and read it so often, that I do not think my account will
+contain any essential error.
+
+A woman, who was subject to the magnetic influence, or who was what is
+commonly called a _somnambule_, had a cancer in the breast. M. ----, one
+of the principal magnetisers of Paris, and from whom, among others, I
+have had an account of the whole affair, was engaged to magnetise this
+woman, while M. Cloquet operated on the diseased part. The patient was
+put asleep, or rather into the magnetic trance, for it can scarcely be
+called sleep, and the cancer was extracted, without the woman's
+_manifesting the least terror, or the slightest sense of pain!_ To the
+truth of the substance of this account, M. Cloquet, who does not pretend
+to explain the reason, nor profess to belong, in any way, to the school,
+simply testifies. He says that he had such a patient, and that she was
+operated on, virtually, as I have told you. Such a statement, coming
+from so high a source, induced the Academy, which is certainly not
+altogether composed of magnetisers, but many of whose members are quite
+animal enough to comprehend the matter, to refer the subject to a
+special committee, which committee, I believe, was comprised of very
+clever men. The substance of their report was pretty much what might
+have been anticipated. They said that the subject was inexplicable, and
+that "animal magnetism" could not be brought within the limits of any
+known laws of nature. They might have said the same thing of the comets!
+In both cases we have facts, with a few established consequences, but
+are totally without elementary causes.
+
+Animal magnetism is clearly one of three things: it is what it pretends
+to be, an unexplained and as yet incomprehensible physical influence; it
+is delusion, or it is absolute fraud.
+
+A young countryman of ours, having made the acquaintance of M. C----,
+professionally, and being full of the subject, I have so far listened to
+his entreaties as to inquire personally into the facts, a step I might
+not have otherwise been induced to take.
+
+I shall now proceed to the history of my own experience in this
+inexplicable mystery. We found M. C---- buried in the heart of Paris, in
+one of those vast old hotels, which give to this town the air of
+generations of houses, commencing with the quaint and noble of the
+sixteenth century, and ending with the more fashionable pavilion of our
+own times. His cabinet looked upon a small garden, a pleasant transition
+from the animal within to the vegetable without. But one meets with
+gardens, with their verdure and shrubbery and trees, in the most
+unexpected manner, in this crowded town.
+
+M. C---- received us politely, and we found with him one of his
+_somnambules_; but as she had just come out of a trance, we were told
+she could not be put asleep again that morning. Our first visit,
+therefore, went no farther than some discourse on the subject of "animal
+magnetism," and a little practical by-play, that shall be related in its
+place.
+
+M. C---- did not attempt ascending to first principles, in his
+explanations. Animal magnetism was animal magnetism--it was a fact, and
+not a theory. Its effects were not to be doubted; they depended on
+testimony of sufficient validity to dispose of any mere question of
+authenticity. All that he attempted was hypothesis, which he invited us
+to controvert. He might as well have desired me to demonstrate that the
+sun is not a carbuncle. On the _modus operandi_, and the powers of his
+art, the doctor was more explicit. There were a great many gradations in
+quality in his _somnambules_, some being better and some worse; and
+there was also a good deal of difference in the _intensity_ of the
+_magnetiser's_. It appears to be settled that the best _somnambules_ are
+females, and the best _magnetisers_ males, though the law is not
+absolute. I was flattered with being, by nature, a first-rate
+magnetiser, and the doctor had not the smallest doubt of his ability to
+put me to sleep; and ability, so far as his theory went, I thought it
+was likely enough he might possess, though I greatly questioned his
+physical means.
+
+I suppose it is _primâ facie_ evidence of credulity, to take the trouble
+to inquire into the subject at all; at any rate it was quite evident I
+was set down as a good subject, from the moment of my appearance. Even
+the _somnambule_ testified to this, though she would not then consent to
+be put into a trance in order to give her opinion its mystical sanction.
+
+The powers of a really good _somnambule_ are certainly of a very
+respectable class. If a lock of hair be cut from the head of an invalid,
+and sent a hundred leagues from the provinces, such a _somnambule_,
+properly magnetised, becomes gifted with the faculty to discover the
+seat of the disease, however latent; and, by practice, she may even
+prescribe the remedy, though this is usually done by a physician, like
+M. C----, who is regularly graduated. The _somnambule_ is, properly,
+only versed in pathology, any other skill she may discover being either
+a consequence of this knowledge, or the effects of observation and
+experience. The powers of a _somnambule_ extend equally to the _morale_
+as well as to the _physique_. In this respect a phrenologist is a pure
+quack in comparison with a lady in a trance. The latter has no
+dependence on bumps and organs, but she looks right through you, at a
+glance, and pronounces _ex cathedrâ_, whether you are a rogue, or an
+honest man; a well-disposed, or an evil-disposed child of Adam. In this
+particular, it is an invaluable science, and it is a thousand pities all
+young women were not magnetised before they pronounce the fatal vows, as
+not a few of them would probably wake up, and cheat the parson of his
+fee. Our sex is difficult to be put asleep, and are so obstinate, that I
+doubt if they would be satisfied with a shadowy glimpse of the temper
+and dispositions of their mistresses.
+
+You may possibly think I am trifling with you, and that I invent as I
+write. On the contrary, I have not related one half of the miraculous
+powers which being magnetised imparts to the thoroughly good
+_somnambule_, as they were related to me by M. C----, and vouched for by
+four or five of his patients who were present, as well as by my own
+companion, a firm believer in the doctrine. M. C---- added that
+_somnambules_ improve by practice, as well as _magnetisers_, and that he
+has such command over one of his _somnambules_ that he can put her to
+sleep, by a simple effort of the will, although she may be in her own
+apartment, in an adjoining street. He related the story of M. Cloquet
+and the cancer, with great unction, and asked me what I thought of that?
+Upon my word, I did not very well know what I did think of it, unless it
+was to think it very queer. It appeared to me to be altogether
+extraordinary, especially as I knew M. Cloquet to be a man of talents,
+and believe him to be honest.
+
+By this time I was nearly magnetised with second-hand facts; and I
+became a little urgent for one or two that were visible to my own sense.
+I was promised more testimony, and a sight of the process of magnetising
+some water that a patient was to drink. This patient was present; the
+very type of credulity. He listened to everything that fell from M.
+C---- with a _gusto_ and a faith that might have worked miracles truly,
+had it been of the right sort, now and then turning his good-humoured
+marvel-eating eyes on me, as much as to say, "What do you think of that,
+now?" My companion told me, in English, he was a man of good estate, and
+of proved philanthropy, who had no more doubt of the efficacy of animal
+magnetism than I had of my being in the room. He had brought with him
+two bottles of water, and these M. C---- _magnetised_, by pointing his
+fingers at their orifices, rubbing their sides, and ringing his hands
+about them as if washing them, in order to disengage the subtle fluid
+that was to impart to them their healing properties, for the patient
+drank no other water.
+
+Presently a young man came in, of a good countenance and certainly of a
+very respectable exterior. As the _somnambule_ had left us, and this
+person could not consult her, which was his avowed intention in coming,
+M. C---- proposed to let me see his own power as a magnetiser, in an
+experiment on this patient. The young man consenting, the parties were
+soon prepared. M. C---- began by telling me, that he would, by _a
+transfusion of his will_, into the body of the patient, compel him to
+sit still, although his own desire should be to rise. In order to
+achieve this, he placed himself before the young man and threw off the
+fluid from his fingers' ends, which he kept in a cluster, by constant
+forward gestures of the arms. Sometimes he held the fingers pointed at
+some particular part of the body, the heart in preference, though the
+brain would have been more poetical. The young man certainly did not
+rise; neither did I, nor any one else in the room. As this experiment
+appeared so satisfactory to everybody else, I was almost ashamed to
+distrust it, easy as it really seemed to sit still, with a man
+flourishing his fingers before one's eyes.
+
+I proposed that the doctor should see if he could pin me down, in this
+invisible fashion, but this he frankly admitted he did not think he
+could do _so soon_, though he foresaw I would become a firm believer in
+the existence of animal magnetism, ere long, and a public supporter of
+its wonders. In time, he did not doubt his power to work the same
+miracle on me. He then varied the experiment, by making the young man
+raise his arm _contrary_ to his wishes. The same process was repealed,
+all the fluid being directed at the arm, which, after a severe trial,
+was slowly raised, until it pointed forward like a finger-board. After
+this he was made to stand up, in spite of himself. This was the hardest
+affair of all, the doctor throwing off the fluid in handfuls; the
+magnetised refusing for some time to budge an inch. At length he
+suddenly stood up, and seemed to draw his breath like one who finally
+yields after a strong trial of his physical force.
+
+Nothing, certainly, is easier than for a young man to sit still and to
+stand up, pretending that he strives internally to resist the desire to
+do either. Still, if you ask me, if I think this was simple collusion, I
+hardly know what to answer. It is the easiest solution, and yet it did
+not strike me as being the true one. I never saw less of the appearance
+of deception than in the air of this young man; his face, deportment,
+and acts being those of a person in sober earnest. He made no
+professions, was extremely modest, and really seemed anxious not to have
+the experiments tried. To my question, if he resisted the will of M.
+C----, he answered, as much as he could, and said, that when he rose, he
+did it because he could not help himself. I confess myself disposed to
+believe in his sincerity and good faith.
+
+I had somewhat of a reputation, when a boy, of effecting my objects by
+pure dint of teasing. Many is the shilling I have abstracted, in this
+way, from my mother's purse, who, constantly affirmed that it was sore
+against her will. Now, it seems to me, that M. C---- may, very easily,
+have acquired so much command over a credulous youth, as to cause him to
+do things of this nature, as he may fancy, against his own will. Signs
+are the substitutes of words, which of themselves are purely
+conventional, and, in his case, the flourishing of the fingers are
+merely so many continued solicitations to get up. When the confirmation
+of a theory that is already received, and which is doubly attractive by
+its mysticisms, depends, in some measure, on the result, the experiment
+becomes still less likely to fail. It is stripping one of all
+pretensions to be a physiognomist, to believe that this young man was
+not honest; and I prefer getting over the difficulty in this way. As to
+the operator himself, he might, or might not, be the dupe of his own
+powers. If the former, I think it would, on the whole, render him the
+more likely to succeed with his subject.
+
+After a visit or two, I was considered sufficiently advanced to be
+scientifically examined. One of the very best of the _somnambules_ was
+employed on the occasion, and everything being in readiness, she was put
+to sleep. There was a faith-shaking brevity in this process, which, to
+say the least, if not fraudulent, was ill-judged. The doctor merely
+pointed his fingers at her once or twice, looking her intently in the
+eye, and the woman gaped; this success was followed up by a flourish or
+two of the hand, and the woman slept, or was magnetised. Now this was
+hardly sufficient even for my theory of the influence of the
+imagination. One could have wished the _somnambule_ had not been so
+drowsy. But there she was, with her eyes shut, giving an occasional
+hearty gape, and the doctor declared her perfectly lit for service. She
+retained her seat, however, moved her body, laughed, talked, and, in all
+other respects, seemed to be precisely the woman she was before he
+pointed his fingers at her. At first, I felt a disposition to manifest
+that more parade was indispensable to humbugging me (who am not the
+Pope, you will remember), but reflection said, the wisest way was to
+affect a little faith, as the surest means of securing more experiments.
+Moreover, I am not certain, on the whole, that the simplicity of the
+operation is not in favour of the sincerity of the parties; for, were
+deception deliberately planned, it would be apt to call in the aid of
+more mummery, and this, particularly, in a case in which there was
+probably a stronger desire than usual to make a convert.
+
+I gave the _somnambule_ my hand, and the examination was commenced,
+forthwith. I was first physically inspected, and the report was highly
+favourable to the condition of the animal. I had the satisfaction of
+hearing from this high authority, that the whole machinery of the mere
+material man was in perfect order, everything working well and in its
+proper place. This was a little contrary to my own experience, it is
+true, but as I had no means of seeing the interior clock-work of my own
+frame, like the _somnambule_, had I ventured to raise a doubt, it would
+have been overturned by the evidence of one who had ocular proofs of
+what she said, and should, beyond question, have incurred the ridicule
+of being accounted a _malade imaginaire_.
+
+Modesty must prevent my recording all that this obliging _somnambule_
+testified to, on the subject of my _morale_. Her account of the matter
+was highly satisfactory, and I must have been made of stone, not to
+credit her and her mysticisms. M. C---- looked at me again and again,
+with an air of triumph, as much as to say, "What do you think of all
+that now?--are you not _really_ the noble, honest, virtuous,
+disinterested, brave creature, she has described you to be?" I can
+assure you, it required no little self-denial to abstain from becoming a
+convert to the whole system. As it is very unusual to find a man with a
+good head, who has not a secret inclination to believe in phrenology, so
+does he, who is thus purified by the scrutiny of animal magnetism, feel
+disposed to credit its mysterious influence. Certainly, I might have
+gaped, in my turn, and commenced the moral and physical dissection of
+the _somnambule_, whose hand I held, and no one could have given me the
+lie, for nothing is easier than to speak _ex cathedrâ_, when one has a
+monopoly of knowledge.
+
+Encouraged by this flattering account of my own condition, I begged hard
+for some more indisputable evidence of the truth of the theory. I
+carried a stop-watch, and as I had taken an opportunity to push the stop
+on entering the room, I was particularly desirous that the _somnambule_
+should tell me the time indicated by its hands, a common test of their
+powers, I had been told; but to this M. C---- objected, referring
+everything of this tangible nature to future occasions. In fine, I could
+get nothing during three or four visits, but pretty positive assertions,
+expressions of wonder that I should affect to doubt what had been so
+often and so triumphantly proved to others, accounts physical and moral,
+like the one of which I had been the subject myself, and which did not
+admit of either confirmation or refutation, and often-repeated
+declarations, that the time was not distant when, in my own unworthy
+person, I was to become one of the most powerful magnetisers of the age.
+All this did very well to amuse, but very little towards convincing; and
+I was finally promised, that at my next visit, the _somnambule_ would be
+prepared to show her powers, in a way that would not admit of cavil.
+
+I went to the appointed meeting with a good deal of curiosity to learn
+the issue, and a resolution not to be easily duped. When I presented
+myself (I believe it was the fourth visit), M. C---- gave me a sealed
+paper, that was not to be opened for several weeks, and which, he said,
+contained the prediction of an event that was to occur to myself,
+between the present time and the day set for the opening of the letter,
+and which the _somnambule_ had been enabled to foresee, in consequence
+of the interest she took in me and mine. With this sealed revelation,
+then, I was obliged to depart, to await the allotted hour.
+
+M. C---- had promised to be present at the opening of the seal, but he
+did not appear. I dealt fairly by him, and the cover was first formally
+removed, on the evening of the day endorsed on its back, as the one when
+it would be permitted. The _somnambule_ had foretold that, in the
+intervening time, one of my children would be seriously ill, that I
+should magnetise it, and the child would recover. Nothing of the sort
+had occurred. No one of the family had been ill, I had not attempted to
+magnetise any one, or even dreamed of it, and, of course, the whole
+prediction was a complete failure.
+
+To do M. C---- justice, when he heard the result, he manifested surprise
+rather than any less confident feeling. I was closely questioned, first,
+as to whether either of the family had not been ill, and secondly,
+whether I had not felt a secret desire to magnetise any one of them. To
+all these interrogatories, truth compelled me to give unqualified
+negatives. I had hardly thought of the subject during the whole time. As
+this interview took place at my own house, politeness compelled me to
+pass the matter off as lightly as possible. There happened to be several
+ladies present, however, the evening M. C---- called, and, thinking the
+occasion a good one for him to try his powers on some one besides his
+regular _somnambules_, I invited him to magnetise any one of the party
+who might be disposed to submit to the process. To this he made no
+difficulty, choosing an English female friend as the subject of the
+experiment. The lady in question raised no objection, and the doctor
+commenced with great zeal, and with every appearance of faith in his own
+powers. No effect, however, was produced on this lady, or on one or two
+more of the party, all of whom obstinately refused even to gape. M.
+C---- gave the matter up, and soon after took his leave, and thus closed
+my personal connexion with animal magnetism.
+
+If you ask me for the conclusions I have drawn from these facts, I shall
+be obliged to tell you, that I am in doubt how far the parties concerned
+deceived others, and how far they deceived themselves. It is difficult
+to discredit entirely all the testimony that has been adduced in behalf
+of this power; and one is consequently obliged to refer all the
+established facts to the influence of the imagination. Then testimony
+itself is but a precarious thing, different eyes seeing the same objects
+in different lights.
+
+Let us take ventriloquism as a parallel case to that of animal
+magnetism. Ventriloquism is neither more nor less than imitation; and
+yet, aided by the imagination, perhaps a majority of those who know
+anything about it, are inclined to believe there is really such a
+faculty as that which is vulgarly attributed to ventriloquism. The whole
+art of the ventriloquist consists in making such sounds as would be
+produced by a person, or thing, that should be actually in the
+circumstances that he wishes to represent. Let there be, for instance,
+five or six sitting around a table, in a room with a single door; a
+ventriloquist among them wishes to mislead his companions, by making
+them believe that another is applying for admission. All he has to do,
+is to make a sound similar to that which a person on the outside would
+make, in applying for admission. "Open the door, and let me in," uttered
+in such a manner, would deceive any one who was not prepared for the
+experiment, simply because men do not ordinarily make such sounds when
+sitting near each other, because the words themselves would draw the
+attention to the door, and because the sounds would be suited to the
+fictitious application. If there were _two_ doors, the person first
+moving his head towards one of them, would probably give a direction to
+the imaginations of all the others; unless, indeed, the ventriloquist
+himself, by his words, or his own movements, as is usually the case,
+should assume the initiative. Every ventriloquist takes especial care to
+_direct_ the imagination of his listener to the desired point, either by
+what he says, by some gesture, or by some movement. Such, undeniably, is
+the fact in regard to ventriloquism; for we know enough of the
+philosophy of sound, to be certain it can he nothing else. One of the
+best ventriloquists of this age, after affecting to resist this
+explanation of his mystery, candidly admitted to me, on finding that I
+stuck to the principles of reason, that all his art consisted of no more
+than a power to control the imagination by imitation supported
+occasionally by acting. And yet I once saw this man literally turn a
+whole family out of doors, in a storm, by an exercise of his art. On
+that occasion, so complete was the delusion, that the good people of the
+house actually fancied sounds which came from the ventriloquist, came
+from a point considerably beyond the place where they stood, and on the
+side _opposite_ to that occupied by the speaker, although they stood at
+the top of a flight of steps, and he stood at the bottom. All this time,
+the sounds appeared to me to come from the place whence, by the laws of
+sound, except in cases of reverberation, and of the influence of the
+imagination, they only could appear to come; or, in other words, from
+the mouth of the ventriloquist himself. Now, if the imagination can
+effect so much, even in crowded assemblies, composed of people of all
+degrees of credulity, intelligence, and strength of mind, and when all
+are prepared, in part at least, for the delusion, what may it not be
+expected to produce on minds peculiarly suited to yield to its
+influence, and this, too, when the prodigy takes the captivating form of
+mysticism and miracles!
+
+In the case of the patient of M. Cloquet, we are reduced to the
+alternatives of denying the testimony, of believing that recourse was
+had to drugs, of referring all to the force of the imagination, or of
+admitting the truth of the doctrine of animal magnetism. The character
+of M. Cloquet, and the motiveless folly of such a course, compel us to
+reject the first; the second can hardly be believed, as the patient had
+not the appearance of being drugged, and the possession of such a secret
+would be almost as valuable as the art in question itself. The doctrine
+of animal magnetism we cannot receive, on account of the want of
+uniformity and exactitude in the experiments; and I think, we are fairly
+driven to take refuge in the force of the imagination. Before doing
+this, however, we ought to make considerable allowances for
+exaggerations, colouring, and the different manner in which men are apt
+to regard the same thing. My young American friend, who _did_ believe in
+animal magnetism, viewed several of the facts I have related with eyes
+more favourable than mine, although even he was compelled to allow that
+M. C---- had much greater success with himself, than with your humble
+servant.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XXIII.
+
+
+Preparations for Departure.--My Consulate.--Leave
+Paris.--Picardy.--Cressy.--Montreuil.--Gate of Calais.--Port of
+Calais.--Magical Words.
+
+
+To R. COOPER, ESQ., COOPERSTOWN.
+
+We entered France in July, 1826, and having remained in and about the
+French capital until February, 1828, we thought it time to change the
+scene. Paris is effectually the centre of Europe, and a residence in it
+is the best training an American can have, previously to visiting the
+other parts of that quarter of the world. Its civilisation, usages, and
+facilities take the edge off our provincial admiration, remove
+prejudices, and prepare the mind to receive new impressions, with more
+discrimination and tact. I would advise all our travellers to make this
+their first stage, and then to visit the North of Europe, before
+crossing the Alps or the Pyrenees. Most people, however, hurry into the
+South, with a view to obtain the best as soon as possible; but it is
+with this, as in most of our enjoyments, a too eager indulgence defeats
+its own aim.
+
+We had decided to visit London, where the season, _or winter_, would
+soon commence. The necessary arrangements were made, and we sent round
+our cards of p.p.c. and obtained passports. On the very day we were to
+quit Paris, an American friend wrote me a note to say that a young
+connexion of his was desirous of going to London, and begged a place for
+her in my carriage. It is, I believe, a peculiar and a respectable trait
+in the national character, that we so seldom hesitate about asking, or
+acceding to, favours of this sort. Whenever woman is concerned, our own
+sex yield, and usually without murmuring. At all events, it was so with
+W----, who cheerfully gave up his seat in the carriage to Miss ----, in
+order to take one in the _coupé_ of the diligence. The notice was so
+short, and the hour so late, that there was no time to get a passport
+for him, and, as he was included in mine, I was compelled to run the
+risk of sending him to the frontiers without one. I was a consul at the
+time,--a titular one as to duties, but in reality as much of a consul as
+if I had ever visited my consulate.[34] The only official paper I
+possessed, in connexion with the office, the commission and _exequatur_
+excepted, was a letter from the Préfet of the Rhône, acknowledging the
+receipt of the latter. As this was strictly a French document, I gave it
+to W---- as proof of my identity, accompanied by a brief statement of
+the reasons why he was without a passport, begging the authorities at
+Need to let him pass as far as the frontier, where I should be in season
+to prove his character. This statement I signed as consul, instructing
+W---- to show it, if applied to for a passport; and if the gendarmes
+disavowed me, to show the letter, by way of proving who I was. The
+expedient was clumsy enough, but it was the best that offered.
+
+[Footnote 34: There being so strong a propensity to cavil at American
+facts, lest this book might fall into European hands, it may be well to
+explain a little. The consulate of the writer was given to him solely to
+avoid the appearance of going over to the enemy, during his residence
+abroad. The situation conferred neither honour nor profit, there being
+no salary, and, in his case, not fees enough to meet the expense of the
+office opened by a deputy. The writer suspects he was much too true to
+the character and principles of his native country, to be voluntarily
+selected by its Government as the object of its honours or rewards, and
+it is certain he never solicited either. There are favours, it would
+seem, that are reserved, in America, for those who most serve the
+interests of her enemies! A day of retribution will come.]
+
+This arrangement settled, we got into the carriage, and took our leave
+of Paris. Before quitting the town, however, I drove round to the Rue
+d'Anjou, to take my leave of General Lafayette. This illustrious man had
+been seriously ill for some weeks, and I had many doubts of my ever
+seeing him again. He did not conceive himself to be in any danger,
+however; but spoke of his speedy recovery as a matter of course, and
+made an engagement with me for the ensuing summer. I bade him adieu,
+with a melancholy apprehension that I should never see him again.
+
+We drove through the gates of Paris, amid the dreariness of a winter's
+evening. You are to understand that everybody quits London and Paris
+just as night sets in. I cannot tell you whether this is caprice, or
+whether it is a usage that has arisen from a wish to have the day in
+town, and a desire to relieve the monotony of roads so often travelled,
+by sleep; but so it is. We did not fall into the fashion simply because
+it is a fashion, but the days are so short in February in these high
+latitudes, that we could not make our preparations earlier.
+
+I have little agreeable to say concerning the first forty miles of the
+journey. It rained; and the roads were, as usual, slippery with mud, and
+full of holes. The old _pavés_ are beginning to give way, however, and
+we actually got a bit of _terre_ within six posts of Paris. This may be
+considered a triumph of modern civilisation; for, whatever may be said
+and sung in favour of Appian ways and Roman magnificence, a more cruel
+invention for travellers and carriage-wheels, than these _pavés_, was
+never invented. A real Paris winter's day is the most uncomfortable of
+all weather. If you walk, no device of leather will prevent the moisture
+from penetrating to your heart; if you ride, it is but an affair of mud
+and _gras de Paris_. We enjoyed all this until nine at night, by which
+time we had got enough of it; and in Beauvais, instead of giving the
+order _à la poste_, the postilion was told to go to an inn. A warm
+supper and good beds put us all in good-humour again.
+
+In putting into the mouth of Falstaff the words, "Shall I not take mine
+ease in mine inn?" Shakspeare may have meant no more than the drowsy
+indolence of a glutton; but they recur to me with peculiar satisfaction
+whenever I get unbooted, and with a full stomach before the warm fire of
+an hotel, after a fatiguing and chilling day's work. If any man doubt
+whether Providence has not dealt justly by all of us in rendering our
+enjoyments dependent on comparative rather than on positive benefits,
+let him travel through a dreary day, and take his comfort at night in a
+house where everything is far below his usual habits, and learn to
+appreciate the truth. The sweetest sleep I have ever had has been caught
+on deck, in the middle watch, under a wet pee-jacket, and with a coil of
+rope for a pillow.
+
+Our next day's work carried us as far as Abbeville, in Picardy. Here we
+had a capital supper of game, in a room that set us all shivering with
+good honest cold. The beds, as usual, were excellent. The country
+throughout all this part of France, is tame and monotonous, with wide
+reaches of grain-lands that are now brown and dreary, here and there a
+wood, and the usual villages of dirty stonehouses. We passed a few
+hamlets, however, that were more than commonly rustic and picturesque,
+and in which the dwellings seemed to be of mud, and were thatched. As
+they were mostly very irregular in form, the street winding through them
+quite prettily, they would have been good in their way, had there been
+any of the simple expedients of taste to relieve their poverty. But the
+French peasants of this province appear to think of little else but
+their wants. There was occasionally a venerable and generous old vine
+clinging about the door, however, to raise some faint impressions of
+happiness.
+
+We passed through, or near, the field of Cressy. By the aid of the
+books, we fancied we could trace the positions of the two armies; but it
+was little more than very vague conjecture. There was a mead, a breadth
+of field well adapted to cavalry, and a wood. The river is a mere brook,
+and could have offered but little protection, or resistance, to the
+passage of any species of troops. I saw no village, and we may not have
+been within a mile of the real field, after all. Quite likely; no one
+knows where it is. It is very natural that the precise sites of great
+events should be lost, though our own history is so fresh and full, that
+to us it is apt to appear extraordinary. In a conversation with a
+gentleman of the Stanley family, lately, I asked him if Latham-House, so
+celebrated for its siege in the civil wars, was still in the possession
+of its ancient proprietors. I was told it no longer existed, and that,
+until quite recently, its positive site was a disputed point, and one
+which had only been settled by the discovery of a hole in a rock, in
+which shot had been cast during the siege, and which hole was known to
+have formerly been in a court. It is no wonder that doubts exist as to
+the identity of Homer, or the position of Troy.
+
+We have anglicised the word Cressy, which the French term Crécy, or, to
+give it a true Picard orthography, Créci. Most of the names that have
+this termination are said to be derived from this province. Many of them
+have become English, and have undergone several changes in the spelling.
+Tracy, or Tracey; de Courcy, or de Courcey; Montmorency; and Lacy, or
+Lacey, were once "Traci," "Courci," "Montmorenci," and "Laci." [35] The
+French get over the disgrace of their ancient defeats very ingeniously,
+by asserting that the English armies of old were principally composed of
+Norman soldiers, and that the chivalrous nobility which performed such
+wonders were of purely Norman blood. The latter was probably more true
+than the former.
+
+[Footnote 35: The celebrated Sir William Draper was once present when the
+subject turned on the descent of families, and the changes that names
+underwent. "Now my own is a proof of what I say," he continued, with the
+intention to put an end to a discourse that was getting to savour of
+family pride; "my family being directly derived from King Pepin." "How
+do you make that out, Sir William?" "By self-evident orthographical
+testimony, as you may see,--Pepin, Pipkin, Napkin, Diaper, Draper."]
+
+As we drew nearer to the coast, the country became more varied.
+Montreuil and Samer are both fortified; and one of these places,
+standing on an abrupt, rocky eminence, is quite picturesque and quaint.
+But we did not stop to look at anything very minutely, pushing forward,
+as fast as three horses could draw us, for the end of our journey. A
+league or two from Boulogne we were met by a half-dozen mounted runners
+from the different inns, each inviting us to give our custom to his
+particular employer. These fellows reminded me of the wheat-runners on
+the hill at Albany; though they were as much more clamorous and earnest,
+as a noisy protestation-making Frenchman is more obtrusive, than a
+shrewd, quiet, calculating Yankee. We did not stop in Boulogne to try
+how true were the voluble representations of these gentry, but, changing
+horses at the post, went our way. The town seemed full of English; and
+we gazed about us, with some curiosity, at a place that has become so
+celebrated by the great demonstration of Napoleon. There is a high
+monument standing at no great distance from the town, to commemorate one
+of his military parades. The port is small and crowded, like most of the
+harbours on both sides of the Channel.
+
+We had rain, and chills, and darkness, for the three or four posts that
+succeeded. The country grew more and more tame, until, after crossing an
+extensive plain of moist meadow-land, we passed through the gate of
+Calais. I know no place that will give you a more accurate notion of
+this celebrated port than Powles Hook. It is, however, necessary to
+enlarge the scale greatly, for Calais is a town of some size, and the
+hommock on which it stands, and the low land by which it is environed,
+are much more considerable in extent than the spot just named.
+
+We drove to the inn that Sterne has immortalised, or one at least that
+bears the same name, and found English comfort united with French
+cookery and French taste. After all, I do not know why I may not say
+French comforts too; for in many respects they surpass their island
+neighbours even in this feature of domestic comfort. It is a comfort to
+have a napkin even when eating a muffin; to see one's self entire in a
+mirror, instead of _edging_ the form into it, or out of it, sideways; to
+drink good coffee; to eat good _côtelettes;_ and to be able to wear the
+same linen for a day, without having it soiled. The Bible says, "Comfort
+me with flagons, or apples," I really forget which,--and if either of
+these is to be taken as authority, a _côtelette_ may surely be admitted
+into the _carte de conforts_.
+
+We found Calais a clear town, and pressing a certain medium aspect, that
+was as much English as French. The position is strong, though I was not
+much struck with the strength of the works. England has no motive to
+wish to possess it, now that conquest on the Continent is neither
+expedient nor possible. The port is good for nothing, in a warlike
+sense, except to protect a privateer or two; though the use of steam
+will probably make it of more importance in any future war, than it has
+been for the last two centuries.
+
+We found W---- safely arrived. At one of the frontier towns he had been
+asked for his passport, and in his fright he gave the letter of the
+Préfet of the Rhône, instead of the explanation I had so cleverly
+devised. This letter commenced with the words "Monsieur le Consul" in
+large letters, and occupying, according to French etiquette, nearly half
+of the first page. The gendarme, a _vieux moustache_, held his lantern
+up to read it, and seeing this ominous title, it would seem that
+Napoleon, and Marengo, and all the glories of the Consulate, arose in
+his imagination. He got no further than those three words, which he
+pronounced aloud; and then folding the letter, he returned it with a
+profound bow, asking no further questions. As the diligence drove on,
+W---- heard him say, "Apparemment vous avez un homme très-considérable
+là-dedans, Monsieur le Conducteur." So much for our fears, for
+passports, and for gendarmes!
+
+We went to bed, with the intention of embarking for England in the
+morning.
+
+THE END
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's Recollections of Europe, by J. Fenimore Cooper
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RECOLLECTIONS OF EUROPE ***
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Recollections of Europe, by J. Fenimore Cooper
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Recollections of Europe
+
+Author: J. Fenimore Cooper
+
+Release Date: November 30, 2006 [EBook #19983]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RECOLLECTIONS OF EUROPE ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Carlo Traverso, Mireille Harmelin and the
+Online Distributed Proofreaders Europe at
+http://dp.rastko.net. This file was produced from images
+generously made available by the Bibliotheque nationale
+de France (BnF/Gallica)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+COLLECTION OF ANCIENT AND MODERN BRITISH AUTHORS.
+
+VOL. CLXXII.
+
+RECOLLECTIONS OF EUROPE.
+
+PRINTED BY J. SMITH, 16, RUE MONTMORENCY.
+
+
+
+
+RECOLLECTIONS OF EUROPE.
+
+BY J. FENIMORE COOPER, ESQ.
+
+AUTHOR OF "THE PILOT," "THE SPY", etc.
+
+
+PARIS, BAUDRY'S EUROPEAN LIBRARY,
+RUE DU COQ, NEAR THE LOUVRE.
+
+
+1837.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+LETTER I.
+
+Our Embarkation.--Leave-taking.--Our Abigail.--Bay of New York.--The
+Hudson.--Ominous Prediction.--The Prophet falsified.--Enter the
+Atlantic.--"Land-birds."--Our Master.--Officers of Packet-ships.--Loss
+of "The Crisis."--The "Three Chimneys."--Calamities at Sea.
+--Sailing-match.--View of the Eddystone.--The Don Quixote.--Comparative
+Sailing.--Pilot-boats.--Coast of Dorsetshire.--The Needles.
+--Lymington.--Southampton Water.--The Custom-house.
+
+
+LETTER II.
+
+Controversy at Cowes.--Custom-house Civility.--English Costume.--Fashion
+in America.--Quadrilles in New York.--Cowes.--Nautical Gallantry.
+English Beauty.--Isle of Wight Butter.--English Scenery.--M'Adamized
+Roads.--Old Village Church.--Rural Interment.--Pauper's
+Grave.--Carisbrooke Cattle.--Southampton.--Waiter at the Vine.--English
+Costume.--Affinity with England.--Netley Abbey.--Southampton Cockneys.
+
+
+LETTER III.
+
+Road to London.--Royal Pastime.--Cockney Coachman.--Winchester Assizes.
+--Approach to London.--The Parks.--Piccadilly.--Street Excursion.
+--Strangers in London.--Americans in England.--Westminster Abbey.
+--Gothic Decorations.--Westminster Hall.--Inquisitive Barber.--Pasta and
+Malibran.--Drury-lane Theatre.--A Pickpocket.--A Fellow-traveller.
+--English Gentlemen.--A Radical.--Encampment of Gipsies.--National
+Distinctions.--Antiquities.--National Peculiarities.
+
+
+LETTER IV.
+
+Quit England.--Approach to France.--Havre.--Our Reception there.--Female
+Commissionnaire.--Clamour of Drums.--Port of Havre.--Projected
+Enterprize.--American Enterprize.--Steam-boat
+Excursion.--Honfleur.--Rouen.--French Exaction.--American
+Porters.--Rouen Cathedral.--Our Cicerone.--A Diligence.--Picturesque
+Road.--European Peasantry.--Aspect of the Country.--Church at
+Louviers.--Village near Vernon.--Rosny.--Mantes.--Bourbon Magnificence.
+--Approach to Paris--Enter Paris.
+
+
+LETTER V.
+
+Paris in August 1826.--Montmartre.--The Octroi.--View of Paris.
+--Montmorency.--Royal Residences.--Duke of Bordeaux.--Horse-racing.
+--The Dauphine.--Popular feeling in Paris.--Royal Equipage.--Gardes du
+Corps.--Policy of Napoleon.--Centralization.
+
+
+LETTER VI.
+
+Letters of Introduction.--European Etiquette.--Diplomatic
+Entertainments.--Ladies in Coffee-houses.--French Hospitality.--Mr.
+Canning at Paris.--Parisian Hotels.--French Lady at
+Washington.--Receptions in Paris and in New York.--Mode of
+Announcement.--Republican Affectation.--Hotel Monaco.--Dinner given to
+Mr. Canning.--Diplomatic Etiquette.--European Ambassadors.--Prime
+Minister of France.--Mr. Canning.--Count Pozzo di Borgo.--Precedency at
+Dinner.--American Etiquette.--A French Dinner.--Servants.--Catholic
+Fasting.--Conversation with Canning.--English Prejudice against
+Americans.
+
+
+LETTER VII.
+
+English Jurisprudence.--English Justice.--Justice in
+France.--Continental Jurisprudence.--Juries.--Legal Injustice.--The Bar
+in France.--Precedence of the Law.
+
+
+LETTER VIII.
+
+Army of France.--Military Display.--Fete of the Trocadero.--Royal
+Review.--Royal Ordinance.--Dissatisfaction.--Hostile
+Demonstration.--Dispersion of Rioters.--French Cavalry.--Learned
+Coachman.--Use of Cavalry.--Cavalry Operations.--The
+Conscription.--National Defence.--Napoleon's Marshals.--Marshal
+Soult--Disaffection of the Army.
+
+
+LETTER IX
+
+Royal Dinner.--Magnificence and Comfort.--Salle de Diane.--Prince de
+Conde.--Duke of Orleans.--The Dinner-table.--The Dauphin.--Sires de
+Coucy.--The Dauphine.--Ancient Usages--M. de Talleyrand.--Charles X.
+--Panoramic Procession.--Droll Effect.--The Dinner.--M. de Talleyrand's
+Office.--The Duchesse de Berri.--The Catastrophe.--An Aristocratic
+Quarrel.
+
+
+LETTER X.
+
+Road to Versailles.--Origin of Versailles.--The present Chateau.--The
+two Trianons.--La Petite Suisse.--Royal Pastime.--Gardens of Versailles.
+--The State Apartments.--Marie Antoinette's Chamber.--Death of Louis XV.
+--Oeil de Boeuf.--The Theatre and Chapel.--A
+Quarry.--Caverns.--Compiegne.--Chateau de Pierre-font.--Influence of
+Monarchy.--Orangery at Versailles.
+
+
+LETTER XI.
+
+Laws of Intercourse.--Americans in Europe.--Americans and English.
+--Visiting in America.--Etiquette of Visits.--Presentations at Foreign
+Courts.--Royal Receptions.--American Pride.--Pay of the President.
+--American Diplomatist.
+
+
+LETTER XII.
+
+Sir Walter Scott in Paris.--Conversation with him.--Copyright in
+America.--Miss Scott.--French Compliments.--Sir Walter Scott's Person
+and Manners.--Ignorance as to America.--French Commerce.--French
+Translations.--American Luxury.
+
+
+LETTER XIII.
+
+French Manufactures.--Sevres China.--Tapestry of the Gobelins.--Paper
+for Hangings.--The Savonnerie.--French Carpets.--American Carpets.
+--Transfer of old Pictures from Wood to Canvass.--Coronation Coach.
+--The Arts in France--in America.--American Prejudice.
+
+
+LETTER XIV.
+
+False Notions.--Continental Manners.--People of Paris.--Parisian Women.
+--French Beauty.--Men of France.--French Soldiers.
+
+
+LETTER XV.
+
+Perversion of Institutions.--The French Academy.--Laplace.--Astronomy.
+--Theatres of Paris.--Immoral Plot.--Artificial Feelings.--French
+Tragedy.--Literary Mania.--The American Press.--American
+Newspapers.--French Journals--Publishing Manoeuvres.--Madame Malibran.
+
+
+LETTER XVI.
+
+Environs of Paris.--Village of St. Ouen.--Our House there.--Life on the
+River.--Parisian Cockneys.--A pretty Grisette.--Voyage across the
+Seine.--A rash Adventurer.--Village Fete.--Montmorency.--View near
+Paris.
+
+
+LETTER XVII.
+
+Rural Drives.--French Peasantry.--View of Montmartre.--The Boulevards.
+--The Abattoirs.--Search for Lodgings.--A queer Breakfast.--Royal
+Progresses and Magnificence.--French Carriages and Horses.--Modes of
+Conveyance.--Drunkenness.--French Criminal Justice.--Marvellous Stories
+of the Police.
+
+
+LETTER XVIII.
+
+Personal Intercourse.--Parisian Society and Hospitality.--Influence of
+Money.--Fiacres.--M. de Lameth.--Strife of Courtesy.--Standard of
+Delicacy.--French Dinners.--Mode of Visiting.--The Chancellor of France.
+--The Marquis de Marbois.--Political Coteries.--Paris Lodgings.--A
+French Party.--An English Party.--A splendid Ball.--Effects of good
+Breeding.--Characteristic Traits.--Influence of a Court.
+
+
+LETTER XIX.
+
+Garden of the Tuileries.--The French Parliament.--Parliamentary
+Speakers.--The Tribune.--Royal Initiative.--The Charter.--Mongrel
+Government.--Ministerial Responsibility.--Elections in
+France.--Doctrinaires.--Differences of Opinion.--Controversy.
+
+
+LETTER XX.
+
+Excursion with Lafayette.--Vincennes.--The Donjon.--Lagrange.--The
+Towers.--Interior of the House--the General's Apartments.--the Cabinet.
+--Lafayette's Title.--Church of the Chateau.--Ruins of Vivier.--Roman
+Remains.--American Curiosity.--The Table at Lagrange.--Swindling.
+
+
+LETTER XXI.
+
+Insecurity of the Bourbons.--Distrust of Americans.--Literary Visitor.
+--The Templars.--Presents and Invitations.--A Spy.--American Virtue.
+--Inconsistency.--Social Freedom in America.--French Mannerists.
+--National Distinctions.--A lively Reaction.
+
+
+LETTER XXII.
+
+Animal Magnetism.--Somnambules.--Magnetised Patients.--My own
+Examination.--A Prediction.--Ventriloquism.--Force of the Imagination.
+
+
+LETTER XXIII.
+
+Preparations for Departure.--My Consulate.--Leave
+Paris.--Picardy.--Cressy.--Montreuil.--Gate of Calais.--Port of
+Calais.--Magical Words.
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+It may seem to be late in the day to give an account of the more ordinary
+characteristics of Europe. But the mass of all nations can form their
+opinions of others through the medium of testimony only; and as no two
+travellers see precisely the same things, or, when seen, view them with
+precisely the same eyes, this is a species of writing, after all, that is
+not likely to pall, or cease to be useful. The changes that are constantly
+going on everywhere, call for as constant repetitions of the descriptions;
+and although the pictures may not always be drawn and coloured equally
+well, so long as they are taken in good faith, they will not be without
+their value.
+
+It is not a very difficult task to make what is commonly called an
+amusing book of travels. Any one who will tell, with a reasonable degree
+of graphic effect, what he has seen, will not fail to carry the reader
+with him; for the interest we all feel in personal adventure is, of
+itself, success. But it is much more difficult to give an honest and a
+discriminating summary of what one has seen. The mind so naturally turns
+to exceptions, that an observer has great need of self-distrust, of the
+powers of analysis, and, most of all, of a knowledge of the world, to be
+what the lawyers call a safe witness.
+
+I have no excuse of haste, or of a want of time, to offer for the defect
+of these volumes. All I ask is, that they may be viewed as no more than
+they profess to be. They are the _gleanings of a harvest already
+gathered_, thrown together in a desultory manner, and without the
+slightest, or, at least, very small pretensions, to any of those
+arithmetical and statistical accounts that properly belong to works of a
+graver character. They contain the passing remarks of one who has
+certainly seen something of the world, whether it has been to his
+advantage or not, who had reasonably good opportunities to examine what
+he saw, and who is not conscious of being, in the slightest degree,
+influenced "by fear, favour, or the hope of reward." His _compte rendu_
+must pass for what it is worth.
+
+
+
+
+FRANCE.
+
+
+LETTER I.
+
+Our Embarkation.--Leave-taking.--Our Abigail.--Bay of New York.
+--The Hudson.--Ominous Prediction.--The Prophet falsified.--Enter the
+Atlantic.--"Land-birds."--Our Master.--Officers of Packet-ships.
+--Loss of "The Crisis."--The "Three Chimneys."--Calamities at Sea.
+--Sailing-match.--View of the Eddystone.--The Don Quixote.
+--Comparative Sailing.--Pilot-boats.--Coast of Dorsetshire.--The Needles.
+--Lymington.--Southampton Water.--The Custom-house.
+
+
+TO CAPTAIN SHUBRICK, U.S.N.
+
+MY DEAR SHUBRICK,
+
+"Passengers by the Liverpool, London and Havre packets are informed that a
+steam-boat will leave the White Hall Wharf precisely at eleven, A.M.
+to-morrow, June 1st." If to this notice be added the year 1826, you have
+the very hour and place of our embarkation. We were nominally of the
+London party, it being our intention, however, to land at Cowes, from
+which place we proposed crossing the Channel to Havre. The reason for
+making this variation from the direct route, was the superior comfort of
+the London ship; that of the French line for the 1st June, though a good
+vessel and well commanded, being actually the least commodious packet that
+plied between the two hemispheres.
+
+We were punctual to the hour, and found one of the smaller steamers
+crowded with those who, like ourselves, were bound to the "old world," and
+the friends who had come to take the last look at them. We had our
+leave-takings, too, which are sufficiently painful when it is known that
+years must intervene before there is another meeting. As is always done by
+good Manhattanese, the town house had been given up on the 1st of May,
+since which time we had resided at an hotel. The furniture had been
+principally sold at auction, and the entire month had passed in what I
+believed to be very ample preparations. It may be questioned if there is
+any such thing as being completely prepared for so material a change; at
+all events, we found a dozen essentials neglected at the last moment, and
+as many oversights to be repaired in the same instant.
+
+On quitting the hotel, some fifty or a hundred volumes and pamphlets lay
+on the floor of my bed-room. Luckily, you were to sail on a cruise in a
+day or two, and as you promised not only to give them a berth, but to read
+them one and all, they were transferred forthwith to the Lexington. They
+were a dear gift, if you kept your word! John was sent with a note, with
+orders to be at the wharf in half an hour. I have not seen him since. Then
+Abigail was to be discharged. We had long debated whether this excellent
+woman should, or should not, be taken. She was an American, and like most
+of her countrywomen who will consent to serve in a household, a most
+valuable domestic. She wished much to go, but, on the other side, was the
+conviction, that a woman who had never been at sea would be useless during
+the passage; and then we were told so many fine things of the European
+servants, that the odds were unfortunately against her. The principal
+objection, however, was her forms of speech. Foreign servants would of
+themselves be a great aid in acquiring the different languages; and poor
+Abigail, at the best, spoke that least desirable of all corruptions of the
+English tongue, the country dialect of New England. Her New England morals
+and New England sense; in this instance, were put in the balance against
+her "bens," "_an_-gels," "doozes," "nawthings," "noans," and even her
+"virtooes," (in a family of children, no immaterial considerations,) and
+the latter prevailed. We had occasion to regret this decision. A few years
+later I met in Florence an Italian family of high rank, which had brought
+with them from Philadelphia two female domestics, whom they prized above
+all the other servants of a large establishment. Italy was not good enough
+for them, however; and, after resisting a great deal of persuasion, they
+were sent back. What was Florence or Rome to Philadelphia! But then these
+people spoke good English--better, perhaps, than common English
+nursery-maids, the greatest of their abuses in orthoepy being merely to
+teach a child to call its mother a "mare."
+
+It was a flat calm, and the packets were all dropping down the bay with
+the ebb. The day was lovely, and the view of the harbour, which _has_ so
+many, while it _wants_ so many, of the elements of first-rate scenery, was
+rarely finer. All estuaries are most beautiful viewed in the calm; but
+this is peculiarly true of the Bay of New York--neither the colour of the
+water, nor its depth, nor the height of the surrounding land, being
+favourable to the grander efforts of Nature. There is little that is
+sublime in either the Hudson, or its mouth; but there is the very extreme
+of landscape beauty.
+
+Experience will teach every one, that without returning to scenes that
+have made early impressions, after long absences, and many occasions to
+examine similar objects elsewhere, our means of comparison are of no
+great value. My acquaintance with the Hudson has been long and very
+intimate; for to say that I have gone up and down its waters a hundred
+times, would be literally much within the truth. During that journey
+whose observations and events are about to fill these volumes, I
+retained a lively impression of its scenery, and, on returning to the
+country, its current was ascended with a little apprehension that an eye
+which had got to be practised in the lights and shades of the Alps and
+Appenines might prove too fastidious for our own river. What is usually
+termed the grandeur of the highlands was certainly much impaired; but
+other parts of the scenery gained in proportion; and, on the whole, I
+found the passage between New York and Albany to be even finer than it
+had been painted by memory. I should think there can be little doubt
+that, if not positively the most beautiful river, the Hudson possesses
+some of the most beautiful river-scenery, of the known world.
+
+Our ship was named after this noble stream. We got on board of her off
+Bedlow's, and dropped quietly down as far as the quarantine ground before
+we were met by the flood. Here we came to, to wait for a wind, more
+passengers, and that important personage, whom man-of-war's men term the
+master, and landsmen the captain. In the course of the afternoon we had
+all assembled, and began to reconnoitre each other, and to attend to our
+comforts.
+
+To get accustomed to the smell of the ship, with its confined air, and
+especially to get all their little comforts about them in smooth water, is
+a good beginning for your novices. If to this be added moderation in food,
+and especially in drink; as much exercise as one can obtain; refraining
+from reading and writing until accustomed to one's situation, and paying
+great attention to the use of aperients; I believe all is said that an old
+traveller, and an old sailor too, can communicate on a subject so
+important to those who are unaccustomed to the sea. Can your experience
+suggest anything more?
+
+We lay that night at the quarantine ground; but early on the morning of
+the 2nd, all hands were called to heave-up. The wind came in puffs over
+the heights of Staten, and there was every prospect of our being able to
+get to sea in two or three hours. We hove short, and sheeted home, and
+hoisted the three topsails; but the anchor hung, and the people were
+ordered to get their breakfasts, leaving the ship to tug at her
+ground-tackle with a view to loosen her hold of the bottom.
+
+Everything was now in motion. The little Don Quixote, the Havre ship just
+mentioned, was laying through the narrows, with a fresh breeze from the
+south-west. The Liverpool ship was out of sight, and six or seven sails
+were turning down with the ebb, under every stitch of canvass that would
+draw. One fine vessel tacked directly on our quarter. As she passed quite
+near our stern, some one cried from her deck:--"A good run to you,
+Mr. ----." After thanking this well-wisher, I inquired his name. He gave me
+that of an Englishman, who resided in Cuba, whither he was bound. "How
+long do you mean to be absent?" "Five years." "You will never come back."
+With this raven-like prediction we parted; the wind sweeping his vessel
+beyond the reach of the voice.
+
+These words, "You will never come back!" were literally the last that I
+heard on quitting my country. They were uttered in a prophetic tone, and
+under circumstances that were of a nature to produce an impression. I
+thought of them often, when standing on the western verge of Europe, and
+following the course of the sun toward the land in which I was born; I
+remembered them from the peaks of the Alps, when the subtle mind,
+outstripping the senses, would make its mysterious flight westward across
+seas and oceans, to recur to the past, and to conjecture the future; and
+when the allotted five years were up, and found us still wanderers, I
+really began to think, what probably every man thinks, in some moment of
+weakness, that this call from the passing ship was meant to prepare me for
+the future. The result proved in my case, however, as it has probably
+proved in those of most men, that Providence did not consider me of
+sufficient importance to give me audible information of what was about to
+happen. So strong was this impression to the last, notwithstanding, that
+on our return, when the vessel passed the spot where the evil-omened
+prediction was uttered, I caught myself muttering involuntarily, "---- is
+a false prophet; I _have_ come back!"
+
+We got our anchor as soon as the people were ready, and, the wind drawing
+fresh through the narrows, were not long turning into lower bay. The ship
+was deep, and had not a sufficient spread of canvass for a summer passage,
+but she was well commanded, and exceedingly comfortable.
+
+The wind became light in the lower bay. The Liverpool ship had got to sea
+the evening before, and the Don Quixote was passing the Hook, just as we
+opened the mouth of the Raritan. A light English bark was making a fair
+wind of it, by laying out across the swash; and it now became questionable
+whether the ebb would last long enough to sweep us round the south-west
+spit, a _detour_ that our heavier draught rendered necessary.
+
+By paying great attention to the ship, however, the pilot, who was of the
+dilatory school, succeeded about 3 P.M. in getting us round that awkward
+but very necessary buoy, which makes so many foul winds of fair ones, when
+the ship's bead was laid to the eastward, with square yards. In half an
+hour the vessel had "slapped" past the low sandy spit of land that you
+have so often regarded with philosophical eyes, and we fairly entered the
+Atlantic, at a point where nothing but water lay between us and the Rock
+of Lisbon. We discharged the pilot on the bar.
+
+By this time the wind had entirely left us, the flood was making strong,
+and there was a prospect of our being compelled to anchor. The bark was
+nearly hull-down in the offing, and the top-gallant-sails of the Don
+Quixote were just settling into the water. All this was very provoking,
+for there might be a good breeze to seaward, while we had it calm inshore.
+The suspense was short, for a fresh-looking line along the sea to the
+southward gave notice of the approach of wind; the yards were braced
+forward, and in half an hour we were standing east southerly, with strong
+headway. About sunset we passed the light vessel which then lay moored
+several leagues from land, in the open ocean,--an experiment that has
+since failed. The highlands of Navesink disappeared with the day.
+
+The other passengers were driven below before evening. The first mate, a
+straight-forward Kennebunk man, gave me a wink, (he had detected my
+sea-education by a single expression, that of "send it an end," while
+mounting the side of the ship,) and said, "A clear quarter-deck! a good
+time to take a walk, sir." I had it all to myself, sure enough, for the
+first two or three days, after which our land-birds came crawling up, one
+by one; but long before the end of the passage nothing short of a
+double-reefed-topsail breeze could send the greater part of them below.
+There was one man, however, who, the mate affirmed wore the heel of a
+spare topmast smooth, by seating himself on it, as the precise spot where
+the motion of the ship excited the least nausea. I got into my berth at
+nine; but hearing a movement overhead about midnight, I turned out again,
+with a sense of uneasiness I had rarely before experienced at sea. The
+responsibility of a large family acted, in some measure, like the
+responsibility of command. The captain was at his post, shortening sail,
+for it blew fresher: there was some rain; and thunder and lightning were
+at work in the heavens in the direction of the adjacent continent: the air
+was full of wild, unnatural lucidity, as if the frequent flashes left a
+sort of twilight behind them; and objects were discernible at a distance
+of two or three leagues. We had been busy in the first watch, as the omens
+denoted easterly weather; the English bark was struggling along the
+troubled waters, already quite a league on our lee quarter.
+
+I remained on deck half an hour, watching the movements of the master. He
+was a mild, reasoning Connecticut man, whose manner of ministering to the
+wants of the female passengers had given me already a good opinion of his
+kindness and forethought, while it left some doubts of his ability to
+manage the rude elements of drunkenness and insubordination which existed
+among the crew, quite one half of whom were Europeans. He was now on deck
+in a southwester,[1] giving his orders in a way effectually to shake all
+that was left of the "horrors" out of the ship's company. I went below,
+satisfied that we were in good hands; and before the end of the passage, I
+was at a loss to say whether Nature had most fitted this truly worthy man
+to be a ship-master or a child's nurse, for he really appeared to me to be
+equally skilful in both capacities.
+
+[Footnote 1: Doric--_south_-wester.]
+
+Such a temperament is admirably suited to the command of a packet--a
+station in which so many different dispositions, habits and prejudices are
+to be soothed, at the same time that a proper regard is to be had to the
+safety of their persons. If any proof is wanting that the characters of
+seamen in general have been formed under adverse circumstances, and
+without sufficient attention, or, indeed, any attention to their real
+interests, it is afforded in the fact, that the officers of the
+packet-ships, men usually trained like other mariners, so easily adapt
+their habits to their new situation, and become more mild, reflecting and
+humane. It is very rare to hear a complaint against an officer of one of
+these vessels; yet it is not easy to appreciate the embarrassments they
+have frequently to encounter from whimsical, irritable, ignorant, and
+exacting passengers. As a rule, the eastern men of this country make the
+best packet-officers. They are less accustomed to sail with foreigners
+than those who have been trained in the other ports, but acquire habits of
+thought and justice by commanding their countrymen; for, of all the seamen
+of the known world, I take it the most subordinate, the least troublesome,
+and the easiest to govern, so long as he is not oppressed is the native
+American. This, indeed, is true, both ashore and afloat, for very obvious
+reasons: they who are accustomed to reason themselves, being the most
+likely to submit to reasonable regulations; and they who are habituated to
+plenty, are the least likely to be injured by prosperity, which causes
+quite as much trouble in this world as adversity. It is this prosperity,
+too suddenly acquired, which spoils most of the labouring Europeans who
+emigrate; while they seldom acquire the real, frank independence of
+feeling which characterizes the natives. They adopt an insolent and rude
+manner as its substitute, mistaking the shadow for the substance. This
+opinion of the American seamen is precisely the converse of what is
+generally believed in Europe, however, and more particularly in England;
+for, following out the one-sided political theories in which they have
+been nurtured, disorganization, in the minds of the inhabitants of the old
+world, is inseparable from popular institutions.
+
+The early part of the season of 1826 was remarkable for the quantities of
+ice that had drifted from the north into the track of European and
+American ships. The Crisis, a London packet, had been missing nearly three
+months when we sailed. She was known to have been full of passengers, and
+the worst fears were felt for her safety; ten years have since elapsed,
+and no vestige of this unhappy ship has ever been found!
+
+Our master prudently decided that safety was of much more importance than
+speed, and he kept the Hudson well to the southward. Instead of crossing
+the banks, we were as low as 40 deg., when in their meridian; and although we
+had some of the usual signs, in distant piles of fog, and exceedingly
+chilly and disagreeable weather, for a day or two, we saw no ice. About
+the 15th, the wind got round to the southward and eastward, and we began
+to fall off, more than we wished even, to the northward.
+
+All the charts for the last fifty years have three rocks laid down to the
+westward of Ireland, which are known as the "Three Chimneys." Most
+American mariners have little faith in their existence, and yet, I fancy,
+no seaman draws near the spot where they are said to be, without keeping a
+good look-out for the danger. The master of the Hudson once carried a
+lieutenant of the English navy, as a passenger, who assured him that he
+had actually seen these "Three Chimneys." He may have been mistaken, and
+he may not. Our course lay far to the southward of them; but the wind
+gradually hauled ahead, in such a way as to bring us as near as might be
+to the very spot where they ought to appear, if properly laid down. The
+look-outs of a merchant-ship are of no great value, except in serious
+cases, and I passed nearly a whole night on deck, quite as much incited by
+my precious charge, as by curiosity, in order to ascertain all that eyes
+could ascertain under the circumstances. No signs of these rocks, however,
+were seen from the Hudson.
+
+It is surprising in the present state of commerce, and with the vast
+interests which are at stake, that any facts affecting the ordinary
+navigation between the two hemispheres should be left in doubt. There is
+a shoal, and I believe a reef, laid down near the tail of the great
+bank, whose existence is still uncertain. Seamen respect this danger
+more than that of the "Three Chimneys," for it lies very much in the
+track of ships between Liverpool and New York; still, while tacking, or
+giving it a berth, they do not know whether they are not losing a wind
+for a groundless apprehension! Our own government would do well to
+employ a light cruiser, or two, in ascertaining just these facts (many
+more might he added to the list), during the summer months. Our own
+brief naval history is pregnant with instances of the calamities that
+befall ships. No man can say when, or how, the Insurgente, the
+Pickering, the Wasp, the Epervier, the Lynx, and the Hornet disappeared.
+We know that they are gone; and of all the brave spirits they held, not
+one has been left to relate the histories of the different disasters. We
+have some plausible conjectures concerning the manner in which the two
+latter were wrecked; but an impenetrable mystery conceals the fate of
+the four others. They may have run on unknown reefs. These reefs may be
+constantly heaving up from the depths of the ocean, by subterranean
+efforts; for a marine rock is merely the summit of a submarine
+mountain.[2]
+
+[Footnote 2: There is a touching incident connected with the fortunes of
+two young officers of the navy, that is not generally known. When the
+Essex frigate was captured in the Pacific, by the Phoebe and Cherub, two
+of the officers of the former were left in the ship, in order to make
+certain affidavits that were necessary to the condemnation. The remainder
+were paroled and returned to America. After a considerable interval, some
+uneasiness was felt at the protracted absence of those who had been left
+in the Essex. On inquiry it was found, that, after accompanying the ship
+to Rio Janeiro, they had been exchanged, according to agreement, and
+suffered to go where they pleased. After some delay, they took passage in
+a Swedish brig bound to Norway, as the only means which offered to get to
+Europe, whence they intended to return home. About this time great
+interest was also felt for the sloop Wasp. She had sailed for the mouth of
+the British Channel, where she fell in with and took the Reindeer,
+carrying her prisoners into France. Shortly after she had an action with
+and took the Avon, but was compelled to abandon her prize by others of the
+enemy's cruisers, one of which (the Castilian) actually came up with her
+and gave her a broad-side. About twenty days after the latter action she
+took a merchant-brig, near the Western Islands, and sent her into
+Philadelphia. This was the last that had been heard of her. Months and
+even years went by, and no farther intelligence was obtained. All this
+time, too, the gentlemen of the Essex were missing. Government ordered
+inquiries to be made in Sweden for the master of the brig in which they
+had embarked; he was absent on a long voyage, and a weary period elapsed
+before he could be found. When this did happen, he was required to give an
+account of his passengers. By producing his logbook and proper receipts,
+he proved that he had fallen in with the Wasp, near the line, about a
+fortnight after she had taken the merchant-brig named, when the young
+officers in question availed themselves of the occasion to return to their
+flag. Since that time, a period of twenty-one years, the Wasp has not been
+heard of.]
+
+We were eighteen days out, when, early one morning, we made an American
+ship, on our weather quarter. Both vessels had everything set that would
+draw, and were going about five knots, close on the wind. The stranger
+made a signal to speak us, and, on the Hudson's main-topsail being laid to
+the mast, he came down under our stern, and ranged up alongside to
+leeward. He proved to be a ship called the "London Packet," from
+Charlestown, bound to Havre, and his chronometer having stopped, he wanted
+to get the longitude.
+
+When we had given him our meridian, a trial of sailing commenced, which
+continued without intermission for three entire days. During this time, we
+had the wind from all quarters, and of every degree of force, from the
+lightest air to a double-reefed-topsail breeze. We were never a mile
+separated, and frequently we were for hours within a cable's length of
+each other. One night the two ships nearly got foul, in a very light air.
+The result showed, that they sailed as nearly alike, one being deep and
+the other light, as might well happen to two vessels. On the third day,
+both ships being under reefed topsails, with the wind at east, and in
+thick weather, after holding her own with us for two watches, the London
+Packet edged a little off the wind, while the Hudson still hugged it, and
+we soon lost sight of our consort in the mist.
+
+We were ten days longer struggling with adverse winds. During this time
+the ship made all possible traverses, our vigilant master resorting to
+every expedient of an experienced seaman to get to the eastward. We were
+driven up as high as fifty-four, where we fell into the track of the St.
+Lawrence traders. The sea seemed covered with them, and I believe we made
+more than a hundred, most of which were brigs. All these we passed without
+difficulty. At length a stiff breeze came from the south-west, and we laid
+our course for the mouth of the British Channel under studding-sails.
+
+On the 28th we got bottom in about sixty fathoms water. The 29th was thick
+weather, with a very light, but a fair wind; we were now quite sensibly
+within the influence of the tides. Towards evening the horizon brightened
+a little, and we made the Bill of Portland, resembling a faint bluish
+cloud. It was soon obscured, and most of the landsmen were incredulous
+about its having been seen at all. In the course of the night, however, we
+got a good view of the Eddystone.
+
+Going on deck early on the morning of the 30th, a glorious view
+presented itself. The day was fine, clear, and exhilarating, and the
+wind was blowing fresh from the westward. Ninety-seven sail, which had
+come into the Channel, like ourselves, during the thick weather, were in
+plain sight. The majority were English, but we recognized the build of
+half the maritime nations of Christendom in the brilliant fleet.
+Everybody was busy, and the blue waters were glittering with canvass. A
+frigate was in the midst of us, walking through the crowd like a giant
+stepping among pigmies. Our own good vessel left everything behind her
+also, with the exception of two or three other bright-sided ships, which
+happened to be as fast as herself.
+
+I found the master busy with the glass; and, as soon as he caught my
+eye, he made a sign for me to come forward. "Look at that ship directly
+ahead of us!" The vessel alluded to led the fleet, being nearly
+hull-down to the eastward. It was the Don Quixote, which had left the
+port of New York one month before, about the same distance in our
+advance. "Now look here, inshore of us," added the master: "it is an
+American; but I cannot make her out." "Look again: she has a new cloth
+in her main-top-gallant sail." This was true enough, and by that sign,
+the vessel was our late competitor, the London Packet!
+
+As respects the Don Quixote, we had made a journey of some five thousand
+miles, and not varied our distance, on arriving, a league. There was
+probably some accident in this; for the Don Quixote had the reputation of
+a fast ship, while the Hudson was merely a pretty fair sailer. We had
+probably got the best of the winds. But a hard and close trial of three
+days had shown that neither the Hudson nor the London Packet, in their
+present trims, could go ahead of the other in any wind. And yet here,
+after a separation of ten days, during which time our ship had tacked and
+wore fifty times, had calms, foul winds and fair, and had run fully a
+thousand miles, there was not a league's difference between the two
+vessels!
+
+I have related these circumstances, because I think they are connected
+with causes that have a great influence on the success of American
+navigation. On passing several of the British ships to-day, I observed
+that their officers were below, or at least out of sight; and in one
+instance, a vessel of a very fair mould, and with every appearance of a
+good sailer, actually lay with some of her light sails aback, long enough
+to permit us to come up with and pass her. The Hudson probably went with
+this wind some fifteen or twenty miles farther than this loiterer; while I
+much question if she could have gone as far, had the latter been well
+attended to. The secret is to be found in the fact, that so large a
+portion of American ship-masters are also ship-owners, as to have erected
+a standard of activity and vigilance, below which few are permitted to
+fall. These men work for themselves, and, like all their countrymen, are
+looking out for something more than a mere support.
+
+About noon we got a Cowes pilot. He brought no news, but told us the
+English vessel I have just named was sixty days from Leghorn, and that she
+had been once a privateer. We were just thirty from New York.
+
+We had distant glimpses of the land all day, and several of the passengers
+determined to make their way to the shore in the pilot-boat. These Channel
+craft are sloops of about thirty or forty tons, and are rather picturesque
+and pretty boats, more especially when under low sail. They are usually
+fitted to take passengers, frequently earning more in this way than by
+their pilotage. They have the long sliding bowsprit, a short lower mast,
+very long cross-trees, with a taunt topmast, and, though not so "wicked"
+to the eye, I think them prettier objects at sea than our own schooners.
+The party from the Hudson had scarcely got on board their new vessel when
+it fell calm, and the master and myself paid them a visit. They looked
+like a set of smugglers waiting for the darkness to run in. On our return
+we rowed round the ship. One cannot approach a vessel at sea, in this
+manner, without being struck with the boldness of the experiment which
+launched such massive and complicated fabrics on the ocean. The pure water
+is a medium almost as transparent as the atmosphere, and the very keel is
+seen, usually so near the surface, in consequence of refraction, as to
+give us but a very indifferent opinion of the security of the whole
+machine. I do not remember ever looking at my own vessel, when at sea,
+from a boat, without wondering at my own folly in seeking such a home.
+
+In the afternoon the breeze sprang up again, and we soon lost sight of our
+friends, who were hauling in for the still distant land. All that
+afternoon and night we had a fresh and a favourable wind. The next day I
+went on deck, while the people were washing the ship. It was Sunday, and
+there was a flat calm. The entire scene admirably suited a day of rest.
+The Channel was like a mirror, unruffled by a breath of air, and some
+twenty or thirty vessels lay scattered about the view, with their sails
+festooned and drooping, thrown into as many picturesque positions by the
+eddying waters. Our own ship had got close in with the land; so near,
+indeed, as to render a horse or a man on the shore distinctly visible. We
+were on the coast of Dorsetshire. A range of low cliffs lay directly abeam
+of us, and, as the land rose to a ridge behind them, we had a distinct
+view of a fair expanse of nearly houseless fields. We had left America
+verdant and smiling, but we found England brown and parched, there having
+been a long continuance of dry easterly winds.
+
+The cliffs terminated suddenly, a little way ahead of the ship, and the
+land retired inward, with a wide sweep, forming a large, though not a very
+deep bay, that was bounded by rather low shores. It was under these very
+cliffs, on which we were looking with so much pleasure and security, and
+at so short a distance, that the well-known and terrible wreck of an
+Indiaman occurred, when the master, with his two daughters, and hundreds
+of other lives, were lost. The pilot pointed out the precise spot where
+that ill-fated vessel went to pieces. But the sea in its anger, and the
+sea at rest, are very different powers. The place had no terrors for us.
+
+Ahead of us, near twenty miles distant, lay a high hazy bluff, that was
+just visible. This was the western extremity of the Isle of Wight, and the
+end of our passage in the Hudson. A sloop of war was pointing her head in
+towards this bluff, and all the vessels in sight now began to take new
+forms, varying and increasing the picturesque character of the view. We
+soon got a light air ourselves, and succeeded in laying the ship's head
+off shore, towards which we had been gradually drifting nearer than was
+desirable. The wind came fresh and fair about ten, when we directed our
+course towards the distant bluff. Everything was again in motion. The
+cliffs behind us gradually sunk, as those before us rose, and lost their
+indistinctness; the blue of the latter soon became grey, and, ere long,
+white as chalk, this being the material of which they are, in truth,
+composed.
+
+We saw a small whale (it might have been a large grampus) floundering
+ahead of us, and acting as an extra pilot, for he appeared to be steering,
+like ourselves, for the Needles. These Needles are fragments of the chalk
+cliffs, that have been pointed and rendered picturesque by the action of
+the weather, and our course lay directly past them. They form a line from
+the extremity of the Isle of Wight, and are awkwardly placed for vessels
+that come this way in thick weather, or in the dark. The sloop of war got
+round them first, and we were not far behind her. When fairly within the
+Needles the ship was embayed, our course now lying between Hampshire and
+the Isle of Wight, through a channel of no great width. The country was
+not particularly beautiful, and still looked parched; though we got a
+distant view of one pretty town, Lymington, in Hampshire. This place, in
+the distance, appeared not unlike a large New England village, though
+there was less glare to the houses. The cliffs, however, were very fine,
+without being of any extraordinary elevation. Though much inferior to the
+shores of the Mediterranean, they as much surpass anything I remember to
+have seen on our own coast, between Cape Anne and Cape Florida; which, for
+its extent, a part of India, perhaps, excepted, is, I take it, just the
+flattest, and tamest, and least interesting coast in the entire world.
+
+The master pointed out a mass of dark herbage on a distant height, which
+resembled a copse of wood that had been studiously clipped into square
+forms at its different angles. It was visible only for a few moments,
+through a vista in the hills. This was Carisbrooke Castle, buried in ivy.
+
+There was another little castle, on a low point of land, which was erected
+by Henry VIII. as a part of a system of marine defence. It would scarcely
+serve to scale the guns of a modern twenty-four-pounder frigate, judging
+of its means of resistance and annoyance by the eye. These things are
+by-gones for England, a country that has little need of marine batteries.
+
+About three, we reached a broad basin, the land retiring on each side of
+us. The estuary to the northward is called Southampton Water, the town of
+that name being seated on its margin. The opening in the Isle of Wight is
+little more than a very wide mouth to a very diminutive river or creek,
+and Cowes, divided into East and West, lines its shores. The anchorage in
+the arm of the sea off this little haven was well filled with vessels,
+chiefly the yachts of amateur seamen, and the port itself contained little
+more than pilot-boats and crafts of a smaller size. The Hudson brought up
+among the former. Hauling up the forecourse of a merchant-ship is like
+lifting the curtain again on the drama of the land. These vessels rarely
+furl this sail; and they who have not experienced it, cannot imagine what
+a change it produces on those who have lived a month or six weeks beneath
+its shadow. The sound of the chain running out was very grateful, and I
+believe, though well satisfied with the ship as such, that everybody was
+glad to get a nearer view of our great mother earth.
+
+It was Sunday, but we were soon visited by boats from the town. Some came
+to carry us ashore, others to see that we carried nothing off with us. At
+first, the officer of the customs manifested a desire to make us all go
+without the smallest article of dress, or anything belonging to our most
+ordinary comforts; but he listened to remonstrances, and we were
+eventually allowed to depart with our night-bags. As the Hudson was to
+sail immediately for London, all our effects were sent within the hour to
+the custom-house. At 3 P.M. July 2nd, 1826, we put foot in Europe, after a
+passage of thirty-one days from the quarantine ground.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER II.
+
+Controversy at Cowes.--Custom-house Civility.--English Costume.--Fashion
+in America.--Quadrilles in New York.--Cowes.--Nautical Gallantry.
+English Beauty.--Isle of Wight Butter.--English Scenery.--M'Adamized
+Roads.--Old Village Church.--Rural Interment.--Pauper's
+Grave.--Carisbrooke Cattle.--Southampton.--Waiter at the Vine.--English
+Costume.--Affinity with England.--Netley Abbey.--Southampton Cockneys.
+
+
+TO MRS. POMEROY, COOPERSTOWN, NEW YORK.
+
+We were no sooner on English ground, than we hurried to one of the two or
+three small inns of West Cowes, or the principal quarter of the place, and
+got rooms at the Fountain. Mr. and Mrs. ---- had preceded us, and were
+already in possession of a parlour adjoining our own. On casting an eye
+out at the street, I found them, one at each window of their own room,
+already engaged in a lively discussion of the comparative merits of Cowes
+and Philadelphia! This propensity to exaggerate the value of whatever is
+our own, and to depreciate that which is our neighbour's, a principle that
+is connected with the very ground-work of poor human nature, forms a
+material portion of travelling equipage of nearly every one who quits the
+scenes of his own youth, to visit those of other people. A comparison
+between Cowes and Philadelphia is even more absurd than a comparison
+between New York and London, and yet, in this instance, it answered the
+purpose of raising a lively controversy between an American wife and a
+European husband.
+
+The consul at Cowes had been an old acquaintance at school some
+five-and-twenty years before, and an inquiry was set on foot for his
+residence. He was absent in France, but his deputy soon presented himself
+with an offer of services. We wished for our trunks, and it was soon
+arranged that there should be an immediate examination. Within an hour we
+were summoned to the store-house, where an officer attended on behalf of
+the customs. Everything was done in a very expeditious and civil manner,
+not only for us, but for a few steerage passengers, and this, too, without
+the least necessity for a _douceur_, the usual _passe-partout_ of England.
+America sends no manufactures to Europe; and, a little smuggling in
+tobacco excepted, there is probably less of the contraband in our
+commercial connexion with England, than ever before occurred between two
+nations that have so large a trade. This, however, is only in reference to
+what goes eastward, for immense amounts of the smaller manufactured
+articles of all Europe find their way, duty free, into the United States.
+There is also a regular system of smuggling through the Canadas, I have
+been told.
+
+While the ladies were enjoying the negative luxury of being liberated from
+a ship, at the Fountain Inn, I strolled about the place. You know that I
+had twice visited England professionally before I was eighteen; and, on
+one occasion, the ship I was in anchored off this very island, though not
+at this precise spot. I now thought the people altered. There had
+certainly been so many important changes in myself during the same period,
+that it becomes me to speak with hesitation on this point: but even the
+common class seemed less peculiar, less English, _less provincial_, if one
+might use such an expression, as applied to so great a nation; in short,
+more like the rest of the world than formerly. Twenty years before,
+England was engaged in a war, by which she was, in a degree, isolated from
+most of Christendom. This insulated condition, sustained by a
+consciousness of wealth, knowledge, and power, had served to produce a
+decided peculiarity of manners, and even of appearance. In the article of
+dress I could not be mistaken. In 1806 I had seen all the lower classes of
+the English clad in something like _costumes_. The Channel waterman wore
+the short dowlas petticoat; the Thames waterman, a jacket and breeches of
+velveteen, and a badge; the gentleman and gentlewoman, attire such as was
+certainly to be seen in no other part of the Christian world, the English
+colonies excepted. Something of this still remained, but it existed rather
+as the exception than as the rule. I then felt, at every turn, that I was
+in a foreign country; whereas, now, the idea did not obtrude itself,
+unless I was brought in immediate contact with the people.
+
+America, in my time, at least, has always had an active and swift
+communication with the rest of the world. As a people, we are, beyond a
+question, decidedly provincial; but our provincialism is not exactly one
+of external appearance. The men are negligent of dress, for they are much
+occupied, have few servants, and clothes are expensive; but the women
+dress remarkably near the Parisian _modes_. We have not sufficient
+confidence in ourselves to set fashions. All our departures from the
+usages of the rest of mankind are results of circumstances, and not of
+calculation,--unless, indeed, it be one that is pecuniary. Those whose
+interest it is to produce changes cause fashions to travel fast, and there
+is not so much difficulty, or more cost, in transporting anything from
+Havre to New York, than there is in transporting the same thing from
+Calais to London; and far less difficulty in causing a new _mode_ to be
+introduced, since, as a young people, we are essentially imitative. An
+example or two will better illustrate what I mean.
+
+When I visited London, with a part of my family, in 1823, after passing
+near two years on the continent of Europe, Mrs. ---- was compelled to
+change her dress--at all times simple, but then, as a matter of course,
+Parisian--in order not to be the subject of unpleasant observation. She
+might have gone in a carriage attired as a Frenchwoman, for they who ride
+in England are not much like those who walk; but to walk in the streets,
+and look at objects, it was far pleasanter to seem English than to seem
+French. Five years later, we took London on our way to America, and even
+then something of the same necessity was felt. On reaching home, with
+dresses fresh from Paris, the same party was only in the _mode_; with
+_toilettes_ a little, and but very little, better arranged, it is true,
+but in surprising conformity with those of all around them. On visiting
+our own little retired mountain village, these Parisian-made dresses were
+scarcely the subject of remark to any but to your _connoisseurs_. My
+family struck me as being much less peculiar in the streets of C---- than
+they had been, a few months before, in the streets of London. All this
+must be explained by the activity of the intercourse between France and
+America, and by the greater facility of the Americans in submitting to the
+despotism of foreign fashions.
+
+Another fact will show you another side of the subject. While at Paris, a
+book of travels in America, written by an Englishman (Mr. Vigne), fell
+into my hands. The writer, apparently a well-disposed and sensible man,
+states that he was dancing _dos-a-dos_ in a _quadrille_, at New York, when
+he found, by the embarrassment of the rest of the set, he had done
+something wrong. Some one kindly told him that they no longer danced
+_dos-a-dos_. In commenting on this trifling circumstance, the writer
+ascribes the whole affair to the false delicacy of our women! Unable to
+see the connexion between the cause and the effect, I pointed out the
+paragraph to one of my family, who was then in the daily practice of
+dancing, and that too in Paris itself, the very court of Terpsichore. She
+laughed, and told me that the practice of dancing _dos-a-dos had gone out
+at Paris a year or two before_, and that doubtless the newer _mode_ had
+reached New York before it reached Mr. Vigne! These are trifles, but they
+are the trifles that make up the sum of national peculiarities, ignorance
+of which leads us into a thousand fruitless and absurd conjectures. In
+this little anecdote we learn the great rapidity with which new fashions
+penetrate American usages, and the greater ductility of American society
+in visible and tangible things, at least; and the heedless manner with
+which even those who write in a good spirit of America, jump to their
+conclusions. Had Captain Hall, or Mrs. Trollope, encountered this unlucky
+_quadrille_, they would probably have found some clever means of imputing
+the _nez-a-nez_ tendencies of our dances to the spirit of democracy! The
+latter, for instance, is greatly outraged by the practice of wearing hats
+in Congress, and of placing the legs on tables; and, yet, both have been
+practised in Parliament from time immemorial! She had never seen her own
+Legislature, and having a set of theories cut and dried for Congress,
+everything that struck her as novel was referred to one of her
+preconceived notions. In this manner are books manufactured, and by such
+means are nations made acquainted with each other!
+
+Cowes resembles a toy-town. The houses are tiny; the streets, in the
+main, are narrow, and not particularly straight, while everything is
+neat as wax. Some new avenues, however, are well planned, and, long ere
+this, are probably occupied; and there were several small marine villas
+in or near the place. One was shown me that belonged to the Duke of
+Norfolk. It had the outward appearance of a medium-sized American
+country-house. The bluff King Hal caused another castle to be built
+here also, which, I understood, was inhabited at the time by the family
+of the Marquis of Anglesey, who was said to be its governor. A part of
+the system of the English government patronage is connected with these
+useless castles and nominally fortified places. Salaries are attached to
+the governments, and the situations are usually bestowed on military
+men. This is a good or a bad regulation, as the patronage is used. In a
+nation of extensive military operations it might prove a commendable and
+a delicate way of rewarding services; but, as the tendency of mankind is
+to defer to intrigue, and to augment power rather than to reward merit,
+the probability is, that these places are rarely bestowed, except in the
+way of political _quids pro quos_.
+
+I was, with one striking exception, greatly disappointed in the general
+appearance of the females that I met in the streets. While strolling in
+the skirts of the town, I came across a group of girls and boys, in which
+a laughable scene of nautical gallantry was going on. The boys, lads of
+fourteen or fifteen, were young sailors, and among the girls, who were of
+the same age and class, was one of bewitching beauty. There had been some
+very palpable passages of coquetry between the two parties, when one of
+the young sailors, a tight lad of thirteen or fourteen, rushed into the
+bevy of petticoats, and, borne away by an ecstasy of admiration, but
+certainly guided by an excellent taste, he seized the young Venus round
+the neck, and dealt out some as hearty smacks as I remember to have heard.
+The working of emotion in the face of the girl was a perfect study.
+Confusion and shame came first; indignation followed; and, darting out
+from among her companions, she dealt her robust young admirer such a
+slap in the face, that it sounded like the report of a pocket-pistol.
+The blow was well meant, and admirably administered. It left the mark of
+every finger on the cheek of the sturdy little fellow. The lad clenched
+his fist, seemed much disposed to retort in kind, and ended by telling
+his beautiful antagonist that it was very fortunate for her she was not
+a boy. But it was the face of the girl herself that drew my attention.
+It was like a mirror which reflected every passing thought. When she
+gave the blow, it was red with indignation. This feeling instantly gave
+way to a kinder sentiment, and her colour softened to a flush of
+surprise at the boldness of her own act. Then came a laugh, and a look
+about her, as if to inquire if she had been very wrong; the whole
+terminating in an expression of regret in the prettiest blue eyes in the
+world, which might have satisfied any one that an offence occasioned by
+her own sweet face was not unpardonable. The sweetness, the
+ingenuousness, the spirit mingled with softness, exhibited in the
+countenance of this girl, are, I think, all characteristic of the
+English female countenance, when it has not been marble-ized by the
+over-wrought polish of high breeding. Similar countenances occur in
+America, though, I think, less frequently than here; and I believe them
+to be quite peculiar to the Anglo-Saxon race. The workings of such a
+countenance are like the play of lights and shades in a southern sky.
+
+From the windows of the inn we had a very good view of a small
+castellated dwelling that one of the King's architects had caused to be
+erected for himself. The effect of gray towers seen over the tree-tops,
+with glimpses of the lawn, visible through vistas in the copses, was
+exceedingly pretty; though the indescribable influence of association
+prevented us from paying that homage to turrets and walls of the
+nineteenth, that we were ready so devotedly to pay to anything of the
+thirteenth and fourteenth centuries.
+
+We broke bread, for the first time in Europe, that evening, having made
+an early and a hurried dinner on board the ship. The Isle of Wight is
+celebrated for its butter, and yet we found it difficult to eat it! The
+English, and many other European nations, put no salt in their table
+butter; and we, who had been accustomed to the American usage, exclaimed
+with one voice against its insipidity. A near relation of A----'s who
+once served in the British army, used to relate an anecdote on the
+subject of tastes, that is quite in point. A brother officer, who had
+gone safely through the celebrated siege of Gibraltar, landed at
+Portsmouth, on his return home. Among the other privations of his recent
+service, he had been compelled to eat butter whose fragrance scented the
+whole Rock. Before retiring for the night, he gave particular orders to
+have hot rolls and Isle of Wight butter served for breakfast. The first
+mouthful disappointed him, and of course the unlucky waiter suffered.
+The latter protested that he had executed the order to the letter. "Then
+take away your Isle of Wight butter," growled the officer, "and bring me
+some that _has a taste_."
+
+Like him of Gibraltar, we were ready to exclaim, "Take away your Isle of
+Wight butter, and bring us some from the good ship Hudson," which, though
+not quite as fragrant as that which had obtained its odour in a siege, was
+not entirely without a taste. This little event, homely as it may appear,
+is connected with the principle that influences the decisions of more than
+half of those who visit foreign nations. Usages are condemned because they
+are not our own; practices are denounced if their connexion with fitness
+is not self-apparent to our inexperience; and men and things are judged by
+rules that are of local origin and local application. The moral will be
+complete when I add, that we, who were so fastidious about the butter at
+Cowes, after an absence of nearly eight years from America, had the salt
+regularly worked out of all we ate, for months after our return home,
+protesting there was no such thing as good butter in America. Had Mrs. ----
+introduced the Philadelphia butter, however, I think her husband must have
+succumbed, for I believe it to be the best in the world, not even
+excepting that of Leyden.
+
+Towards evening, the Hudson having landed all her passengers, and the most
+of those who were in the steerage, went round the eastern point of the
+little port, on her way to London.
+
+After taking an early breakfast, we all got into a carriage called a
+sociable, which is very like a larger sort of American coaches and went to
+Newport, the principal town in the island. The road ran between hedges,
+and the scenery was strictly English. Small enclosures, copses, a sward
+clipped close as velvet, and trees (of no great size or beauty, however,)
+scattered in the fields, with an effect nearly equal to landscape
+gardening, were the predominant features. The drought had less influence
+on the verdure here than in Dorsetshire. The road was narrow and winding,
+the very _beau ideal_ of a highway; for, in this particular, the general
+rule obtains that what is agreeable is the least useful. Thanks to the
+practical good sense and perseverance of Mr. McAdam, not only the road in
+question, but nearly all the roads of Great Britain have been made, within
+the last five-and-twenty years, to resemble in appearance, but really to
+exceed in solidity and strength, the roads one formerly saw in the grounds
+of private gentlemen. These roads are almost flat, and when they have been
+properly constructed, the wheel rolls over them as if passing along a bed
+of iron. Apart from the levels, which, of course, are not so rigidly
+observed, there is not, any very sensible difference between the draught
+on a really good McAdamized road and on a railroad. We have a few roads in
+America that are nearly as good as most one meets with, but we have
+nothing that deserves to be termed a real imitation of the system of Mr.
+McAdam.
+
+The distance to Newport was only four or five miles. The town itself, a
+borough, but otherwise of little note, lies in a very sweet vale, and is
+neat but plain, resembling, in all but its greater appearance of
+antiquity and the greater size of its churches, one of our own
+provincial towns of the same size. A---- and myself took a fly, and
+went, by a very rural road, to Carisbrooke, a distance of about a mile,
+in quest of lodgings. Carisbrooke is a mere village, but the whole
+valley in this part of the island is so highly cultivated, and so many
+pretty cottages meet the eye--not cottages of the poor, but cottages of
+the rich--that it has an air of finish and high cultivation that we are
+accustomed to see only in the immediate vicinity of large towns, and not
+always even there.
+
+On reaching the hamlet of Carisbrooke we found ourselves immediately
+beneath the castle. There was a fine old village church, one of those
+picturesque rustic edifices which abound in England, a building that time
+had warped and twisted in such a way as to leave few parallel lines, or
+straight edges, or even regular angles, in any part of it. They told us,
+also, that the remains of a ruined priory were at hand. We had often
+laughed since at the eagerness and delight with which we hurried off to
+look at these venerable objects. It was soon decided, however, that it was
+a pleasure too exquisite to be niggardly enjoyed alone, and the carriage
+was sent back with orders to bring up the whole party.
+
+While the fly--a Liliputian coach drawn by a single horse, a sort of
+diminutive buggy--was absent, we went in quest of the priory. The people
+were very civil, and quite readily pointed out the way. We found the ruin
+in a farmyard. There was literally nothing but a very small fragment of a
+blind wall, but with these materials we went to work with the imagination,
+and soon completed the whole edifice. We might even have peopled it, had
+not Carisbrooke, with its keep, its gateway, and its ivy-clad ramparts,
+lain in full view, inviting us to something less ideal. The church,
+too--the rude, old, hump-backed church was already opened, waiting to be
+inspected.
+
+The interior of this building was as ancient, in appearance, at least,
+and quite as little in harmony with right lines and regular angles, as
+its exterior. All the wood-work was of unpainted oak, a colour, however,
+that was scarcely dark enough to be rich; a circumstance which, to
+American eyes, at least--eyes on whose lenses paint is ever
+present--gave it an unfinished look. Had we seen this old building five
+years later, we might have thought differently. As for the English oak,
+of which one has heard so much, it is no great matter: our own common
+oaks are much prettier, and, did we understand their beauty, there would
+not be a village church in America that, in this particular, would not
+excel the finest English cathedral. I saw nothing in all Europe, of this
+nature, that equalled the common oaken doors of the hall at C----, which
+you know so well.
+
+A movement in the church-yard called us out, and we became pained
+witnesses of the interment of two of the "unhonoured dead." The air,
+manner and conduct of these funerals made a deep impression on us both.
+The dead were a woman and a child, but of different families. There were
+three or four mourners belonging to each party. Both the bodies were
+brought in the same horse-cart, and they were buried by the same
+service. The coffins were of coarse wood, stained with black, in a way
+to betray poverty. It was literally _le convoi du pauvre_. Deference to
+their superiors, and the struggle to maintain appearances--for there was
+a semblance of the pomp of woe, even in these extraordinary groups, of
+which all were in deep mourning--contrasted strangely with the extreme
+poverty of the parties, the niggardly administration of the sacred
+offices, and the business-like manner of the whole _transaction_. The
+mourners evidently struggled between natural grief and the bewilderment
+of their situation. The clergyman was a good-looking young man, in a
+dirty surplice. Most probably he was a curate. He read the service in a
+strong voice, but without reverence, and as if he were doing it by the
+job. In every way short measure was dealt out to the poor mourners. When
+the solemn words of "dust to dust, ashes to ashes," were uttered, he
+bowed hastily towards each grave--he stood between them--and the
+assistants met his wholesale administration of the rites with a
+wholesale sympathy.
+
+The ceremony was no sooner over, than the clergyman and his clerk retired
+into the church. One or two of the men cast wistful eyes towards the
+graves, neither of which was half filled, and reluctantly followed. I
+could scarcely believe my senses, and ventured to approach the door. Here
+I met such a view as I had never before seen, and hope never to witness
+again. On one side of me two men were filling the graves; on the opposite,
+two others were actually paying the funeral fees. In one ear was the
+hollow sound of the clod on the coffin; in the other the chinking of
+silver on the altar! Yea, literally on the altar! We are certainly far
+behind this great people in many essential particulars; our manners are
+less formed; our civilization is less perfect; but, thanks to the spirit
+which led our ancestors into the wilderness! such mockery of the Almighty
+and his worship, such a mingling of God and Mammon, never yet disgraced
+the temple within the wide reach of the American borders.
+
+We were joined by the whole party before the sods were laid on the graves
+of the poor; but some time after the silver had been given for the
+consolations of religion. With melancholy reflections we mounted to the
+castle. A---- had been educated in opinions peculiarly favourable to
+England; but I saw, as we walked mournfully away from the spot, that one
+fact like this did more to remove the film from her eyes, than volumes of
+reading.
+
+Carisbrooke has been too often described to need many words. Externally,
+it is a pile of high battlemented wall, completely buried in ivy, forming
+within a large area, that was once subdivided into courts, of which
+however, there are, at present, scarcely any remains. We found an old
+woman as warder, who occupied a room or two in a sort of cottage that had
+been made out of the ruins. The part of the edifice which had been the
+prison of Charles I. was a total ruin, resembling any ordinary house,
+without roof, floors, or chimneys. The aperture of the window through
+which he attempted to escape is still visible. It is in the outer wall,
+against which the principal apartments had been erected. The whole work
+stands on a high irregular ridge of a rocky hill, the keep being much the
+most elevated. We ascended to the sort of bastion which its summit forms,
+whence the view was charming. The whole vale, which contains Carisbrooke
+and Newport, with a multitude of cottages, villas, farm-houses and
+orchards, with meads, lawns and shrubberies, lay in full view, and we had
+distant glimpses of the water. The setting of this sweet picture, or the
+adjacent hills, was as naked and brown as the vale itself was crowded with
+objects and verdant. The Isle of Wight, as a whole, did not strike me as
+being either particularly fertile or particularly beautiful, while it
+contains certain spots that are eminently both. I have sailed entirely
+round it more than once, and, judging from the appearance of its coasts,
+and from what was visible in this little excursion, I should think that it
+had more than a usual amount of waste treeless land. The sea-views are
+fine, as a matter of course, and the air is pure and bracing. It is
+consequently much frequented in summer. It were better to call it the
+"watering-place," than to call it the "garden" of England.
+
+We had come in quest of a house where the family might be left, for a few
+days, while I went up to London. But the whole party was anxious to put
+their feet in _bona fide_ old England before they crossed the Channel, and
+the plan was changed to meet their wishes. We slept that night at Newport,
+therefore, and returned in the morning to Cowes, early enough to get on
+board a steam-boat for Southampton. This town lies several miles up an
+estuary that receives one or two small streams. There are a few dwellings
+on the banks of the latter, that are about the size and of the appearance
+of the better sort of country-houses on the Hudson, although more
+attention appears to have been generally paid to the grounds. There were
+two more of Henry the Eighth's forts; and we caught a glimpse of a fine
+ruined Gothic window in passing Netley Abbey.
+
+We landed on the pier at Southampton about one, and found ourselves truly
+in England. "Boat, sir, boat?" "Coach, sir, coach?" "London, sir,
+London?"--"No; we have need of neither!"--"Thank'ee, sir--thank'ee, sir."
+These few words, in one sense, are an epitome of England. They rang in our
+ears for the first five minutes after landing. Pressing forward for a
+livelihood, a multitude of conveniences, a choice of amusements, and a
+trained, but a heartless and unmeaning civility. "No; I do not want a
+boat." "Thank'ee, sir." You are just as much "thank'ee" if you do not
+employ the man as if you did. You are thanked for condescending to give an
+order, for declining, for listening. It is plain to see that such thanks
+dwell only on the lips. And yet we so easily get to be sophisticated;
+words can be so readily made to supplant things; deference, however
+unmeaning, is usually so grateful, that one soon becomes accustomed to all
+this, and even begins to complain that he is not imposed on.
+
+We turned into the first clean-looking inn that offered. It was called the
+Vine, and though a second-rate house, for Southampton even, we were
+sufficiently well served. Everything was neat, and the waiter, an old man
+with a powdered bead, was as methodical as a clock, and a most busy
+servitor to human wants. He told me he had been twenty-eight years doing
+exactly the same things daily, and in precisely the same place. Think of a
+man crying "Coming, sir," and setting table, for a whole life, within an
+area of forty feet square! Truly, this was not America.
+
+The principal street in Southampton, though making a sweep, is a broad,
+clean avenue, that is lined with houses having, with very few exceptions,
+bow-windows, as far as an ancient gate, a part of the old defences of the
+town. Here the High-street is divided into "Above-bar" and "Below-bar".
+The former is much the most modern, and promises to be an exceedingly
+pretty place when a little more advanced. "Below-bar" is neat and
+agreeable too. The people appeared singularly well dressed, after New
+York. The women, though less fashionably attired than our own, taking the
+Paris modes for the criterion, were in beautiful English chintzes,
+spotlessly neat, and the men all looked as if they had been born with
+hat-brushes and clothes-brushes in their hands, and yet every one was in a
+sort of seashore _costume_. I saw many men whom my nautical instinct
+detected at once to be naval officers,--some of whom must have been
+captains,--in round-abouts; but it was quite impossible to criticise
+toilettes that were so faultlessly neat, and so perfectly well arranged.
+
+We ordered dinner, and sallied forth in quest of lodgings. Southampton is
+said to be peculiar for "long passages, bow-windows, and old maids." I can
+vouch that it merits the two first distinctions. The season had scarcely
+commenced, and we had little difficulty in obtaining rooms, the bow-window
+and long passage included. These lodgings comprise one or more
+drawing-rooms, the requisite number of bed-rooms, and the use of the
+kitchen. The people of the house, ordinarily tradespeople, do the cooking
+and furnish the necessary attendance. We engaged an extra servant, and
+prepared to take possession that evening.
+
+When we returned to the Vine, we found a visitor in this land of
+strangers. Mrs. R----, of New York, a relative and an old friend, had
+heard that Americans of our name were there, and she came doubting and
+hoping to the Vine. We found that the windows of our own drawing-room
+looked directly into those of hers. A few doors below us dwelt Mrs. L----,
+a still nearer relative; and a few days later, we had _vis-a-vis_, Mrs.
+M'A----, a sister of A----'s, on whom we all laid eyes for the first time
+in our lives! Such little incidents recall to mind the close
+consanguinity of the two nations; although for myself, I have always
+felt as a stranger in England. This has not been so much from the want
+of kindness and a community of opinion many subjects, as from a
+consciousness, that in the whole of that great nation, there is not a
+single individual with whom I could claim affinity. And yet, with a
+slight exception, we are purely of English extraction. Our father was
+the great-great-grandson of an Englishman. I once met with a man, (an
+Englishman,) who bore so strong a resemblance to him, in stature, form,
+walk, features and expression, that I actually took the trouble to
+ascertain his name. He even had our own. I had no means of tracing the
+matter any farther; but here was physical evidence to show the affinity
+between the two people. On the other hand, A---- comes of the Huguenots.
+She is purely American by every intermarriage, from the time of Louis
+the Fourteenth down, and yet she found cousins in England at every turn,
+and even a child of the same parents, who was as much of an Englishwoman
+as she herself was an American.
+
+We drank to the happiness of America, at dinner. That day, fifty years,
+she declared herself a nation; that very day, and nearly at that hour,
+two of the co-labourers in the great work we celebrated, departed in
+company for the world of spirits!
+
+A day or two was necessary to become familiarized to the novel objects
+around us, and my departure for London was postponed. We profited by the
+delay, to visit Netley Abbey, a ruin of some note, at no great distance
+from Southampton. The road was circuitous, and we passed several pretty
+country-houses, few of which exceeded in size or embellishments,
+shrubbery excepted, similar dwellings at home. There was one, however,
+of an architecture much more ancient than we had been accustomed to see,
+it being, by all appearance, of the time of Elizabeth or James. It had
+turrets and battlements, but was otherwise plain.
+
+The abbey was a fine, without being a very imposing, ruin, standing in the
+midst of a field of English neatness, prettily relieved by woods. The
+window already mentioned formed the finest part. The effect of these ruins
+on us proved the wonderful power of association. The greater force of the
+past than of the future on the mind, can only be the result of
+questionable causes. Our real concern with the future is incalculably the
+greatest, and yet we are dreaming over our own graves, on the events and
+scenes which throw a charm around the graves of those who have gone before
+us! Had we seen Netley Abbey, just as far advanced towards completion, as
+it was, in fact, advanced towards decay, our speculations would have been
+limited by a few conjectures on its probable appearance; but gazing at it
+as we did, we peopled its passages, imagined Benedictines stalking along
+its galleries, and fancied that we heard the voices of the choir, pealing
+among its arches.
+
+Our fresh American feelings were strangely interrupted by the sounds of
+junketing. A party of Southampton cockneys, (there are cockneys even in
+New York,) having established themselves on the grass, in one of the
+courts, were lighting a fire, and were deliberately proceeding to make
+tea! "To tea, and ruins," the invitations most probably run. We
+retreated into a little battery of the bluff King Hal, that was near by,
+a work that sufficiently proved the state of nautical warfare in the
+sixteenth century.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER III.
+
+Road to London.--Royal Pastime.--Cockney Coachman.--Winchester Assizes.
+--Approach to London.--The Parks.--Piccadilly.--Street Excursion.
+--Strangers in London.--Americans in England.--Westminster Abbey.
+--Gothic Decorations.--Westminster Hall.--Inquisitive Barber.--Pasta
+and Malibran.--Drury-lane Theatre.--A Pickpocket.--A Fellow-traveller.
+--English Gentlemen.--A Radical.--Encampment of Gipsies.--National
+Distinctions.--Antiquities.--National Peculiarities.
+
+
+To R. COOPER, ESQ. COOPERSTOWN.
+
+At a very early hour one of the London coaches stopped at the door. I had
+secured a seat by the side of the coachman, and we went through the "bar"
+at a round trot. The distance was about sixty miles, and I had paid a
+guinea for my place. There were four or five other passengers, all on the
+outside.
+
+The road between Southampton and London is one of little interest; even
+the highway itself is not as good as usual, for the first twenty or thirty
+miles, being made chiefly of gravel, instead of broken stones. The soil
+for a long distance was thirsty, and the verdure was nearly gone. England
+feels a drought sooner than most countries, probably from the
+circumstances of its vegetation being so little accustomed to the absence
+of moisture, and to the comparative lightness of the dews. The winds,
+until just before the arrival of the Hudson, had been blowing from the
+eastward for several weeks, and in England this is usually a dry wind. The
+roads were dusty, the hedges were brown, and the fields had nothing to
+boast of over our own verdure. Indeed, it is unusual to see the grasses
+of New York so much discoloured, so early in the season.
+
+I soon established amicable relations with my companion on the box. He had
+been ordered at the Vine to stop for an American, and he soon began to
+converse about the new world. "Is America anywhere near Van Diemen's
+Land?" was one of his first questions. I satisfied him on this head, and
+he apologised for the mistake, by explaining that he had a sister settled
+in Van Diemen's Land, and he had a natural desire to know something about
+her welfare! We passed a house which had more the air of a considerable
+place than any I had yet seen, though of far less architectural
+pretensions than the miniature castle near Cowes. This, my companion
+informed me, had once been occupied by George IV. when Prince of Wales.
+"Here his Royal Highness enjoyed what I call the perfection of life, sir;
+women, wine, and fox-hunting!" added the professor of the whip, with the
+leer of a true amateur.
+
+These coachmen are a class by themselves. They have no concern with
+grooming the horses, and keep the reins for a certain number of relays.
+They dress in a particular way, without being at all in livery or
+uniform, like the continental postilions, talk in a particular way, and
+act in a particular way. We changed this personage for another, about
+half the distance between Southampton and London. His successor proved
+to be even a still better specimen of his class. He was a thorough
+cockney, and altogether the superior of his country colleague, he was
+clearly the oracle of the boys, delivering his sentiments in the manner
+of one accustomed to dictate to all in and about the stables. In
+addition to this, there was an indescribable, but ludicrous salvo to his
+dignity, in the way of surliness. Some one had engaged him to carry a
+blackbird to town, and caused him to wait. On this subject he sang a
+Jeremiad in the true cockney key. "He didn't want to _take_ the
+_bla-a-a-ck-bud_; but if the man wanted to _send_ the _bla-a-a-ck-bud_,
+why didn't he _bring_ the _bla-a-a-ck-bud_?" This is one of the hundred
+dialects of the lower classes of the English. One of the horses of the
+last team was restiff, and it became necessary to restrain him by an
+additional curb before we ventured into the streets of London. I
+intimated that I had known such horses completely subdued in America by
+filling their ears with cotton. This suggestion evidently gave offence,
+and he took occasion soon after to show it. He wrung the nose of the
+horse with a cord, attaching its end below, in the manner of a severe
+martingale. While going through this harsh process, which, by the way,
+effectually subdued the animal, he had leisure to tell him that "he was
+an _English_ horse, and not an _out-landish_ horse, and _he_ knew best
+what was good for him," with a great deal more similar sound
+nationality.
+
+Winchester was the only town of any importance on the road. It is
+pleasantly seated in a valley, is of no great size, is but meanly built,
+though extremely neat, has a cathedral and a bishop, and is the shire-town
+of Hampshire. The assizes were sitting, and Southampton was full of troops
+that had been sent from Winchester, in order to comply with a custom which
+forbids the military to remain near the courts of justice. England is full
+of these political mystifications, and it is one of the reasons that she
+is so much in arrears in many of the great essentials. In carrying out the
+practice in this identical case, a serious private wrong was inflicted, in
+order that, in form, an abstract and perfectly useless principle might be
+maintained. The inns at Southampton were filled with troops, who were
+billeted on the publicans, will ye, nill ye; and not only the masters of
+the different houses, but travellers were subjected to a great
+inconvenience, in order that this abstraction might not be violated. There
+may be some small remuneration, but no one can suppose for a moment, that
+the keeper of a genteel establishment of this nature wishes to see his
+carriage-houses, gateways, and halls thronged with soldiers. Society
+oppresses him to maintain appearances! At the present day the presence of
+soldiers might be the means of sustaining justice, while there is not the
+smallest probability that they would be used for contrary purposes, except
+in cases in which this usage or law--for I believe there is a statue for
+it--would not be in the least respected. This is not an age, nor is
+England the country, in which a judge is to be overawed by the roll of a
+drum. All sacrifices of common sense, and all recourse to plausible
+political combinations, whether of individuals or of men, are uniformly
+made at the expense of the majority. The day is certainly arrived when
+absurdities like these should be done away with.
+
+The weather was oppressively hot, nor do I remember to have suffered more
+from the sun than during this little journey. Were I to indulge in the
+traveller's propensity to refer everything to his own state of feeling,
+you might be told what a sultry place England is in July. But I was too
+old a sailor not to understand the cause. The sea is always more temperate
+than the land, being cooler in summer and warmer in winter. After being
+thirty days at sea, we all feel this truth, either in one way or the
+other. I was quitting the coast, too, which is uniformly cooler than the
+interior.
+
+When some twelve or thirteen miles from town, the coachman pointed to a
+wood enclosed by a wall, on our left. A rill trickled from the thicket,
+and ran beneath the road. I was told that Virginia Water lay there, and
+that the evening before a single footpad had robbed a coach in that
+precise spot, or within a few hundred yards of the very place where the
+King of England at the moment was amusing himself with the fishing-rod.
+Highway robberies, however are now of exceedingly rare occurrence, that in
+question being spoken of as the only one within the knowledge of my
+informant for many years.
+
+Our rate of travelling was much the same as that of one of our own better
+sort of stages. The distance was not materially less than that between
+Albany and C----n; the roads were not so hilly, and much better than our
+own road; and yet, at the same season, we usually perform it in about the
+same time that we went the distance between Southampton and London. The
+scenery was tame, nor, with the exception of Winchester, was there a
+single object of any interest visible until we got near London. We crossed
+the Thames, a stream of trifling expanse, and at Kew we had a glimpse of
+an old German-looking edifice in yellow bricks, with towers, turrets, and
+battlements. This was one of the royal palaces. It stood on the opposite
+side of the river, in the midst of tolerably extensive grounds. Here a
+nearly incessant stream of vehicles commenced. I attempted to count the
+stage-coaches, and got as high as thirty-three, when we met a line of
+mail-coaches, that caused me to stop in despair. I think we met not less
+than fifty within the last hour of our journey. There were seven belonging
+to the mail in one group. They all leave London at the same hour, for
+different parts of the kingdom.
+
+At Hyde Park Corner I began to recall objects known in my early visits
+to London. Apsley House had changed owners, and had become the property
+of one whose great name was still in the germ, when I had last seen his
+present dwelling. The Parks, a gateway or two excepted, were unchanged.
+In the row of noble houses that line Piccadilly--in that
+hospital-looking edifice, Devonshire House--in the dingy, mean,
+irregular, and yet interesting front of St. James's--in Brookes's,
+White's, the Thatched House, and various other historical _monuments_, I
+saw no change. Buckingham House had disappeared, and an unintelligible
+pile was rising on its ruins. A noble "_palazzo-non-finito_" stood at
+the angle between the Green and St. James's Parks, and here and there I
+discovered houses of better architecture than London was wont of old to
+boast. One of the very best of these, I was told, was raised in honour
+of Mercury, and probably out of his legitimate profits. It is called
+Crockford's.
+
+Our "_bla-a-a-ck-bud_" pulled up in the Strand, at the head of
+Adam-street, Adelphi, and I descended from my seat at his side. An extra
+shilling brought the glimmering of a surly smile athwart his
+blubber-cheeks, and we parted in good-humour. My fellow-travellers were
+all men of no very high class, but they had been civil, and were
+sufficiently attentive to my wants, when they found I was a stranger, by
+pointing out objects on the road, and explaining the usages of the inns.
+One of them had been in America, and he boasted a little of his intimacy
+with General This and Commodore That. At one time, too, he appeared
+somewhat disposed to institute comparisons between the two countries, a
+good deal at our expense, as you may suppose; but as I made no answers,
+I soon heard him settling it with his companions, that, after all, it
+was quite natural a man should not like to hear his own country abused;
+and so he gave the matter up. With this exception, I had no cause of
+complaint, but, on the contrary, good reason to be pleased.
+
+I was set down at the Adam-street Hotel, a house much frequented by
+Americans. The respectable woman who has so long kept it received me
+with quiet civility, saw that I had a room, and promised me a dinner in
+a few minutes. While the latter was preparing, having got rid of the
+dust, I went out into the streets. The lamps were just lighted, and I
+went swiftly along the Strand, recalling objects at every step. In this
+manner I passed, at a rapid pace, Somerset House, St. Clement's-le-Dane,
+St. Mary-le-Strand, Temple-bar, Bridge-street, Ludgate-hill, pausing
+only before St. Paul's. Along the whole of this line I saw but little
+change. A grand bridge, Waterloo, with a noble approach to it, had been
+thrown across the river just above Somerset House, but nearly everything
+else remained unaltered. I believe my manner, and the eagerness with
+which I gazed at long-remembered objects, attracted attention; for I
+soon observed I was dogged around the church by a suspicious-looking
+fellow. He either suspected me of evil, or, attracted by my want of a
+London air, he meditated evil himself. Knowing my own innocence, I
+determined to bring the matter to an issue. We were alone, in a retired
+part of the place, and, first making sure that my watch, wallet, and
+handkerchief had not already disappeared, I walked directly up to him,
+and looked him intently in the face, as if to recognize his features. He
+took the hint, and, turning on his heels, moved nimbly of. It is
+surprising how soon an accustomed eye will distinguish a stranger in the
+streets of a large town. On mentioning this circumstance next day
+to ----, he said that the Londoners pretend to recognize a rustic air in
+a countess, if she has been six months from town. Rusticity in such
+cases, however, must merely mean a little behind the fashions.
+
+I had suffered curiosity to draw me two miles from my dinner, and was as
+glad to get back as just before I had been to run away from it. Still
+the past, with the recollections which crowded on the mind, bringing
+with them a flood of all sorts of associations, prevented me from
+getting into a coach, which would, in a measure, have excluded objects
+from my sight. I went to bed that night with the strange sensation of
+being again in London, after an interval of twenty years.
+
+The next day I set about the business which had brought me to the
+English capital. Most of our passengers were in town, and we met, as a
+matter of course. I had calls from three or four Americans established
+here, some in one capacity, and some in others; for our country has long
+been giving back its increase to England, in the shape of admirals,
+generals, judges, artists, writers and _notion-mongers_. But what is all
+this compared to the constant accessions of Europeans among ourselves?
+Eight years later, on returning home, I found New York, in feeling,
+opinions, desires, (apart from profit,) and I might almost say, in
+population, a foreign rather than American town.
+
+I had passed months in London when a boy, and yet had no knowledge of
+Westminster Abbey! I cannot account for this oversight, for I was a great
+devotee of Gothic architecture, of which, by the way, I knew nothing,
+except through the prints; and I could not reproach myself with a want of
+proper curiosity on such subjects, for I had devoted as much time to their
+examination as my duty to the ship would at all allow. Still, all I could
+recall of the abbey was an indistinct image of two towers, with a glimpse
+in at a great door. Now that I was master of my own movements, one of my
+first acts was to hurry to the venerable church.
+
+Westminster Abbey is built in the form of a cross, as is, I believe,
+invariably the case with every Catholic church of any pretension. At its
+northern end are two towers, and at its southern is the celebrated chapel
+of Henry VII. This chapel is an addition, which, allowing for a vast
+difference in the scale, resembles, in its general appearance, a school,
+or vestry-room, attached to the end of one of our own churches. A Gothic
+church is, indeed, seldom complete without such a chapel. It is not an
+easy matter to impress an American with a proper idea of European
+architecture. Even while the edifice is before his eyes, he is very apt to
+form an erroneous opinion of its comparative magnitude. The proportions
+aid deception in the first place, and absence uniformly exaggerates the
+beauty and extent of familiar objects. None but those who have disciplined
+the eye, and who have accustomed themselves to measure proportions by
+rules more definite than those of the fancy, should trust to their
+judgments in descriptions of this sort.
+
+Westminster itself is not large, however, in comparison with St. Paul's,
+and an ordinary parish church, called St. Margaret's, which must be, I
+think, quite as large as Trinity, New York, and stands within a hundred
+yards of the abbey, is but a pigmy compared with Westminster. I took a
+position in St. Margaret's church-yard, at a point where the whole of the
+eastern side of the edifice might be seen, and for the first time in my
+life gazed upon a truly Gothic structure of any magnitude. It was near
+sunset, and the light was peculiarly suited to the sombre architecture.
+The material was a grey stone, that time had rendered dull, and which had
+broad shades of black about its angles and faces. That of the chapel was
+fresher, and of a warmer tint; a change well suited to the greater
+delicacy of the ornaments.
+
+The principal building is in the severer style of the Gothic, without,
+however, being one of its best specimens. It is comparatively plain, nor
+are the proportions faultless. The towers are twins, are far from being
+high, and to me they have since seemed to have a crowded appearance, or to
+be too near each other; a defect that sensibly lessens the grandeur of the
+north front. A few feet, more or less, in such a case, may carry the
+architect too much without, or too much within, the just proportions. I
+lay claim to very little science on the subject, but I have frequently
+observed since, that, to my own eye, (and the uninitiated can have no
+other criterion,) these towers, as seen from the parks, above the tops of
+the trees, have a contracted and pinched air.
+
+But while the abbey church itself is as plain as almost any similar
+edifice I remember, its great extent, and the noble windows and doors,
+rendered it to me deeply impressive. On the other hand, the chapel is an
+exquisite specimen of the most elaborated ornaments of the style. All
+sorts of monstrosities have, at one period or another, been pressed into
+the service of the Gothic, such as lizards, toads, frogs, serpents,
+dragons, spitfires, and salamanders. There is, I believe, some typical
+connexion between these offensive objects and the different sins. When
+well carved, properly placed, and not viewed too near, their effect is far
+from bad. They help to give the edifice its fretted appearance, or a look
+resembling that of lace. Various other features, which have been taken
+from familiar objects, such as parts of castellated buildings,
+portcullises, and armorial bearings, help to make up the sum of the
+detail. On Henry the Seventh's chapel, toads, lizards, and the whole group
+of metaphorical sins are sufficiently numerous, without being offensively
+apparent; while miniature portcullises, escutcheons, and other ornaments,
+give the whole the rich and imaginative--almost fairy-like aspect,--which
+forms the distinctive feature of the most ornamented portions of the
+order. You have seen ivory work-boxes from the East, that were cut and
+carved in a way to render them so very complicated, delicate, and
+beautiful, that they please us without conveying any fixed forms to the
+mind. It would be no great departure from literal truth, were I to bid you
+fancy one of these boxes swelled to the dimensions of a church, the
+material changed to stone, and, after a due allowance for a difference in
+form, for the painted windows, and for the emblems, were I to add, that
+such a box would probably give you the best idea of a highly-wrought
+Gothic edifice, that any comparison of the sort can furnish.
+
+I stood gazing at the pile, until I felt the sensation we term "a
+creeping of the blood." I know that Westminster, though remarkable for
+its chapel, was, by no means, a first-rate specimen of its own style of
+architecture; and, at that moment, a journey through Europe promised to
+be a gradation of enjoyments, each more exquisite than the other. All
+the architecture of America united, would not assemble a tithe of the
+grandeur, the fanciful, or of the beautiful, (a few imitations of
+Grecian temples excepted,) that were to be seen in this single edifice.
+If I were to enumerate the strong and excited feelings which are
+awakened by viewing novel objects, I should place this short visit to
+the abbey as giving birth in me to sensation No. 1. The emotion of a
+first landing in Europe had long passed; our recent "land-fall" had been
+like any other "land-fall," merely pleasant; and I even looked upon St.
+Paul's as an old and a rather familiar friend. This was absolutely my
+introduction to the Gothic, and it has proved to be an acquaintance
+pregnant of more satisfaction than any other it has been my good fortune
+to make since youth.
+
+It was too late to enter the church, and I turned away towards the
+adjoining public buildings. The English kings had a palace at Westminster,
+in the times of the Plantagenets. It was the ancient usage to assemble the
+parliament, which was little more than a _lit de justice_ previously to
+the struggle which terminated in the commonwealth, in the royal residence,
+and, in this manner, Westminster Palace became, permanently, the place for
+holding the meetings of these bodies. The buildings, ancient and modern,
+form a cluster on the banks of the river, and are separated from the abbey
+by a street. I believe their site was once an island.
+
+Westminster Hall was built as the banqueting room of the palace. There is
+no uniformity in the architecture of the pile, which is exceedingly
+complicated and confused. My examination, at this time, was too hurried
+for details; and I shall refer you to a later visit to England for a
+description. A vacant space at the abbey end of the palace is called Old
+Palace-yard, which sufficiently indicates the locality of the ancient
+royal residence; and a similar, but larger space or square, at the
+entrance to the hall, is known as New Palace-yard. Two sides of the latter
+are filled with the buildings of the pile; namely, the courts of law, the
+principal part of the hall, and certain houses that are occupied by some
+of the minor functionaries of the establishment, with buildings to contain
+records, etc. The latter are mean, and altogether unworthy of the
+neighbourhood. They were plastered on the exterior, and observing a hole
+in the mortar, I approached and found to my surprise, that here, in the
+heart of the English capital, as a part of the legislative and judicial
+structures, in plain view, and on the most frequented square of the
+vicinity, were houses actually built of wood, and covered with lath and
+mortar!
+
+The next morning I sent for a hair-dresser. As he entered the room I made
+him a sign, without speaking, to cut my hair. I was reading the morning
+paper, and my operator had got half through with his job, without a
+syllable being exchanged between us, when the man of the comb suddenly
+demanded, "What is the reason, sir, that the Americans think everything in
+their own country so much better than it is everywhere else?" You will
+suppose that the _brusquerie_, as well as the purport of this
+interrogatory, occasioned some surprise. How he knew I was an American at
+all I am unable to say, but the fellow had been fidgeting the whole time
+to break out upon me with this question.
+
+I mention the anecdote, in order to show you how lively and general the
+feeling of jealousy has got to be among our transatlantic kinsmen. There
+will be a better occasion to speak of this hereafter.
+
+London was empty. The fashionable streets were actually without a soul,
+for minutes at a time; and, without seeing it, I could not have believed
+that a town which, at certain times, is so crowded as actually to render
+crossing its streets hazardous, was ever so like a mere wilderness of
+houses. During these recesses in dissipation and fashion, I believe that
+the meanest residents disappear for a few months.
+
+Our fellow-traveller, Mr. L----, however, was in London, and we passed a
+day or two in company. As he is a votary of music, he took me to hear
+Madame Pasta. I was nearly as much struck with the extent and magnificence
+of the Opera-house, as I had been with the architecture of the Abbey. The
+brilliant manner in which it was lighted, in particular, excited my
+admiration, for want of light is a decided and a prominent fault of all
+scenic exhibitions at home, whether they are made in public or in private.
+Madame Pasta played _Semiramide_ "How do you like her?" demanded L----, at
+the close of the first act. "Extremely; I scarce know which to praise the
+most, the command and the range of her voice, or her powers as a mere
+actress. But, don't you think her exceedingly like the _Signorina?_" The
+present Madame Malibran was then singing in New York, under the name of
+Signorina Garcia. L---- laughed, and told me the remark was well enough,
+but I had not put the question in exactly the proper form. "Do you not
+think the Signorina exceedingly like Madame Pasta?" would have been
+better. I had got the matter wrong end foremost.
+
+L---- reminded me of our having amused ourselves on the passage with the
+nasal tones of the chorus at New York. He now directed my attention to
+the same peculiarity here. In this particular I saw no difference; nor
+should there be any, for I believe nearly all who are on the American
+stage, in any character, are foreigners, and chiefly English.
+
+The next day we went to old Drury, where we found a countryman, and
+townsman, Mr. Stephen Price, in the chair of Sheridan. The season was
+over, but we were shown the whole of the interior. It is also a
+magnificent structure in extent and internal embellishment, though a
+very plain brick pile externally. It must have eight or ten times the
+cubic contents of the largest American theatre. The rival building,
+Covent Garden, is within a few hundred feet of it, and has much more of
+architectural pretension, though neither can lay claim to much. The
+taste of the latter is very well, but it is built of that penny-saving
+material, stuccoed bricks.
+
+We dined with Mr. Price, and on the table was some of our own
+justly-celebrated Madeira. L----, who is an oracle on these subjects,
+pronounced it injured. He was told it was so lately arrived from New York,
+that there had not been time to affect it. This fact, coupled with others
+that have since come to my knowledge, induce me to believe that the change
+of tastes, which is so often remarked in liquors, fruits, and other
+eatables, is as much wrought on ourselves, as in the much-abused viands.
+Those delicate organs which are necessary to this particular sense may
+readily undergo modifications by the varieties of temperature. We know
+that taste and its sister sense, smelling, are both temporarily destroyed
+by colds. The voice is signally affected by temperature. In cold climates
+it is clear and soft; in warm, harsh and deep. All these facts would serve
+to sustain the probability of the theory that a large portion of the
+strictures that are lavished on the products of different countries,
+should be lavished on our own capricious organs. _Au reste_, the
+consequence is much the same, let the cause be what it will.
+
+Mr. M----, an Englishman, who has many business concerns with America,
+came in while we were still at table, and I quitted the house in his
+company. It was still broad daylight. As we were walking together, arm and
+arm, my companion suddenly placed a hand behind him, and said, "My fine
+fellow, you are there, are you?" A lad of about seventeen had a hand in
+one of his pockets, feeling for his handkerchief. The case was perfectly
+clear, for Mr. M---- had him still in his gripe when I saw them. Instead
+of showing apprehension or shame, the fellow began to bluster and
+threaten. My companion, after a word or two of advice, hurried me from the
+spot. On expressing the surprise I felt at his permitting such a hardened
+rogue to go at large, he said that our wisest course was to get away. The
+lad was evidently supported by a gang, and we might be beaten as well as
+robbed, for our pains. Besides, the handkerchief was not actually taken,
+attendance in the courts was both expensive and vexatious, and he would be
+bound over to prosecute. In England, the complainant is compelled to
+prosecute, which is, in effect, a premium on crime! We retain many of the
+absurdities of the common law, and, among others, some which depend on a
+distinction between the intention and the commission of the act; but I do
+not know that any of our States are so unjust as to punish a citizen, in
+this way, because he has already been the victim of a rogue.
+
+After all, I am not so certain our law is much better; but I believe more
+of the _onus_ of obtaining justice falls on the injured party here than it
+does with us: still we are both too much under the dominion of the common
+law.
+
+The next day I was looking at a bronze statue of Achilles, at Hyde Park
+Corner, which had been erected in honour of the Duke of Wellington. The
+place, like every other fashionable haunt at that season, was
+comparatively deserted. Still, there might have been fifty persons in
+sight. "Stop him! stop him!" cried a man, who was chasing another directly
+towards me. The chase, to use nautical terms, began to lighten ship by
+throwing overboard first one article and then another. As these objects
+were cast in different directions, he probably hoped that his pursuer,
+like Atalantis, might stop to pick them up. The last that appeared in the
+air was a hat, when, finding himself hemmed in between three of us, the
+thief suffered himself to be taken. A young man had been sleeping on the
+grass, and this land-pirate had absolutely succeeded in getting his shoes,
+his handkerchief, and his hat; but an attempt to _take off his cravat_ had
+awoke the sleeper. In this case, the prisoner was marched off under sundry
+severe threats of vengeance; for the _robbee_ was heated with the run, and
+really looked so ridiculous that his anger was quite natural.
+
+My business was now done, and I left London in a night-coach for
+Southampton. The place of rendezvous was the White Horse Cellar, in
+Piccadilly--a spot almost as celebrated for those who are _in transitu_,
+as was the Isthmus of Suez of old. I took an inside seat this time, for
+the convenience of a nap. At first, I had but a single fellow-traveller.
+Venturing to ask him the names of one or two objects that we passed, and
+fearing he might think my curiosity impertinent, I apologized for it, by
+mentioning that I was a foreigner. "A foreigner!" he exclaimed; "why,
+you speak English as well as I do myself!" I confess I had thought,
+until that moment, that the advantage, in this particular, was
+altogether on my side; but it seems I was mistaken. By way of relieving
+his mind, however, I told him I was an American. "An American!" and he
+seemed more puzzled than ever. After a few minutes of meditation on what
+he had just heard, he civilly pointed to a bit of meadow through which
+the Thames meanders, and good-naturedly told me it was Runnymeade. I
+presume my manner denoted a proper interest, for he now took up the
+subject of the English Barons, and entered into a long account of their
+modern magnificence and wealth. This is a topic that a large class in
+England, who only know their aristocracy by report, usually discuss with
+great unction. They appear to have the same pride in the superiority of
+their great families, that the American slave is known to feel in the
+importance of his master. I say this seriously, and not with a view to
+sneer, but to point out to you a state of feeling that, at first, struck
+me as very extraordinary. I suppose that the feelings of both castes
+depend on a very natural principle. The Englishman, however, as he is
+better educated, has one respectable feature in his deference. He exults
+with reason in the superiority of his betters over the betters of most
+other people: in this particular he is fully borne out by the fact.
+Subsequent observation has given me occasion to observe, that the
+English gentleman, in appearance, attainments, manliness, and perhaps I
+might add, principles, although this and deportment are points on which
+I should speak with less confidence, stands at the head of his class in
+Christendom. This should not be, nor would it be, were the gentlemen of
+America equal to their fortunes, which, unhappily, they are not. Facts
+have so far preceded opinions at home, as to leave but few minds capable
+of keeping in their company. But this is a subject to which we may also
+have occasion to return.
+
+The coach stopped, and we took up a third inside. This man proved to be
+a radical. He soon began to make side-hits at the "nobility and gentry,"
+and, mingled with some biting truths, he uttered a vast deal of
+nonsense. While he was in the midst of his denunciations, the coach
+again stopped, and one of the outsides was driven into it by the night
+air. He was evidently a gentleman, and the guard afterwards told me he
+was a Captain Somebody, and a nephew of a Lord Something, to whose
+country place he was going. The appearance of the captain checked the
+radical for a little while; but, finding that the other was quiet, he
+soon returned to the attack. The aristocrat was silent, and the admirer
+of aristocracy evidently thought himself too good to enter into a
+dispute with one of the mere people; for _to admire_ aristocracy was, in
+his eyes, something like an _illustration_; but wincing under one of the
+other's home-pushes, he said, "These opinions may do very well for this
+gentleman," meaning me, who as yet had not uttered a syllable--"who is
+an American; but I must say, I think them out of place in the mouth of
+an Englishman." The radical regarded me a moment, and inquired if what
+the other had just said was true. I answered that it was. He then began
+an eulogium on America; which, like his Jeremiad on England, had a good
+many truths blended with a great deal of nonsense. At length, he
+unfortunately referred to me, to corroborate one of his most capital
+errors. As this could not be done conscientiously, for his theory
+depended on the material misconstruction of giving the whole legislative
+power to Congress, I was obliged to explain the mistake into which he
+had fallen. The captain and the _toady_ were both evidently pleased; nor
+can I say, I was sorry the appeal had been made, for it had the effect
+of silencing a commentator, who knew very little of his subject. The
+captain manifested his satisfaction, by commencing a conversation, which
+lasted until we all went to sleep. Both the captain and the radical
+quitted us in the night.
+
+Men like the one just described do the truth a great deal of harm. Their
+knowledge does not extend to first principles, and they are always for
+maintaining their positions by a citation of facts. One half of the latter
+are imagined; and even that which is true is so enveloped with collateral
+absurdities, that when pushed, they are invariably exposed. These are the
+travellers who come among us Liberals, and go back Tories. Finding that
+things fall short of the political Elysiums of their imaginations, they
+fly into the opposite extreme, as a sort of _amende honorable_ to their
+own folly and ignorance.
+
+At the distance of a few miles from Winchester, we passed an encampment of
+gipsies, by the way-side. They were better-looking than I had expected to
+see them, though their faces were hardly perceptible in the grey of the
+morning. They appeared well fed and very comfortably bivouacked. Why do
+not these people appear in America? or, do they come, and get absorbed,
+like all the rest, by the humane and popular tendencies of the country?
+What a homage will it be to the institutions, if it be found that even a
+gipsy cease to be a gipsy in such a country! Just as the sun rose, I got
+out to our lodgings and went to bed.
+
+After a sound sleep of two or three hours, I rose and went to the
+drawing-room. A lady was in it, seated in a way to allow me to see no
+more than a small part of her side-face. In that little, I saw the
+countenance of your aunt's family. It was the sister whom we had never
+seen, and who had hastened out of Hertfordshire to meet us. There are
+obvious reasons why such a subject cannot be treated in this letter, but
+the study of two sisters who had been educated, the one in England and
+the other in America, who possessed so much in common, and yet, who were
+separated by so much that was not in common, was to me a matter of
+singular interest. It showed me, at a glance, the manner in which the
+distinctive moral and physical features of nations are formed; the
+points of resemblance being just sufficient to render the points of
+difference more obvious.
+
+A new and nearer route to Netley had been discovered during my absence,
+and our unpractised Americans had done little else than admire ruins for
+the past week. The European who comes to America plunges into the virgin
+forest with wonder and delight; while the American who goes to Europe
+finds his greatest pleasure, at first, in hunting up the memorials of the
+past. Each is in quest of novelty, and is burning with the desire to gaze
+at objects of which he has often read.
+
+The steam-boat made but one or two voyages a week between Southampton
+and Havre, and we were obliged to wait a day or two for the next trip.
+The intervening time was passed in the manner just named. Every place of
+any importance in England has some work or other written on the subject
+of its history, its beauties, and its monuments. It is lucky to escape a
+folio. Our works on Southampton, (which are of moderate dimensions,
+however,) spoke of some Roman remains in the neighbourhood. The spot was
+found, and, although the imagination was of greater use than common in
+following the author's description, we stood on the spot with a species
+of antiquarian awe.
+
+Southampton had formerly been a port of some importance. Many of the
+expeditions sent against France embarked here, and the town had once
+been well fortified, for the warfare of the period. A good deal of the
+old wall remains. All of this was industriously traced out; while the
+bow-windows, long passages, and old maids, found no favour in our eyes.
+
+One simple and touching memorial I well remember. There is a ferry
+between the town and the grounds near Netley Abbey. A lady had caught a
+cold, which terminated in death, in consequence of waiting on the shore,
+during a storm, for the arrival of a boat. To protect others from a
+similar calamity, she had ordered a very suitable defence against the
+weather to be built on the fatal spot, and to be kept in repair for
+ever. The structure is entirely of stone, small and exceedingly simple
+and ingenious. The ground plan is that of a Greek cross. On this
+foundation are reared four walls, which, of course, cross each other in
+the centre at right angles. A little above the height of a man, the
+whole is amply roofed. Let the wind blow which way it will, you perceive
+there is always shelter. There is no external wall, and the diameter of
+the whole does not exceed ten feet, if it be as much. This little work
+is exceedingly English, and it is just as unlike anything American as
+possible. It has its origin in benevolence, is original in the idea, and
+it is picturesque. We might accomplish the benevolence, but it would be
+of a more public character: the picturesque is a thing of which we
+hardly know the meaning; and as for the originality, the dread of doing
+anything different from his neighbour would effectually prevent an
+American from erecting such a shelter; even charity with us being
+subject to the control of the general voice. On the other hand, what a
+clever expedient would have been devised, in the first instance, in
+America, to get across the ferry without taking cold! All these little
+peculiarities have an intimate connexion with national character and
+national habits. The desire to be independent and original causes a
+multitude of silly things to be invented here, while the apprehension of
+doing anything different from those around them causes a multitude of
+silly things to be _perpetuated_ in America; and yet we are children of
+the same parents! When profit is in view, we have but one soul and that
+is certainly inventive enough; but when money has been made, and is to
+be spent, we really do not seem to know how to set about it, except by
+routine.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER IV.
+
+Quit England.--Approach to France.--Havre.--Our Reception there.--Female
+Commissionnaire.--Clamour of Drums.--Port of Havre.--Projected
+Enterprize.--American Enterprize.--Steam-boat
+Excursion.--Honfleur.--Rouen.--French Exaction.--American
+Porters.--Rouen Cathedral.--Our Cicerone.--A Diligence.--Picturesque
+Road.--European Peasantry.--Aspect of the Country.--Church at
+Louviers.--Village near Vernon.--Rosny.--Mantes.--Bourbon Magnificence.
+--Approach to Paris--Enter Paris.
+
+
+To R. COOPER, ESQ., COOPERSTOWN.
+
+On quitting England, we embarked from the very strand where Henry V.
+embarked for the fruitless field of Agincourt. A fearful rumour had gone
+abroad that the Camilla (the steam-boat) had been shorn of a wing, and
+there were many rueful faces in the boat that took us off to the vessel.
+In plainer speech, one of the boilers was out of order, and the passage
+was to be made with just half the usual propelling power. At that
+season, or indeed at any season, the only probable consequence was loss
+of time. With a strong head-wind, it is true, the Camilla might have
+been compelled to return; but this might also have happened with the use
+of both the boilers.
+
+Our adventurers did not see things in this light. The division of
+employments, which produces prices so cheap and good, makes bad
+travellers. Our boat's cargo embarked with fear and trembling, and "She
+has but one boiler!" passed from mouth to mouth amid ominous faces. A
+bachelor-looking personage, of about fifty, with his person well
+swaddled in July, declared in a loud voice, that we were "all going on
+board to be drowned." This startled A----, who, having full faith in my
+nautical experience, asked what we were to think of it? It was a mere
+question between ten hours and fifteen, and so I told her. The females,
+who had just before been trembling with alarm, brightened at this, and
+two or three of them civilly thanked me for the information they had
+thus obtained incidentally!--"Boat, sir! boat!" "Thank 'ee, sir; thank
+'ee, sir."
+
+We found two or three parties on board of a higher condition than
+common. Apprehension cast a shade over the cold marble-like polish of
+even the English aristocrat; for if, as Mrs. Opie has well observed,
+there is nothing "so like a lord in a passion as a commoner in a
+passion," "your fear" is also a sad leveller. The boat was soon under
+way, and gradually our cargo of mental apprehensions settled into the
+usual dolorous physical suffering of landsmen in rough water. So much
+for excessive civilization. The want of a boiler under similar
+circumstances, would have excited no feeling whatever among a similar
+number of Americans, nineteen in twenty of whom, thanks to their
+rough-and-tumble habits, would know exactly what to think of it.
+
+I was seated, during a part of the day, near a group of young men, who
+were conversing with a lady of some three or four and twenty. They
+expressed their surprise at meeting her on board. She told them it was a
+sudden whim; that no one knew of her movements; she meant only to be gone
+a fortnight, to take a run into Normandy. In the course of the
+conversation I learned that she was single, and had a maid and a footman
+with her. In this guise she might go where she pleased; whereas, had she
+taken "an escort" in the American fashion, her character would have
+suffered. This usage, however, is English rather than European. Single
+women on the Continent, except in extraordinary cases, are obliged to
+maintain far greater reserve even than with us; and there, single or
+married, they cannot travel under the protection of any man who is not
+very nearly connected with them, domestics and dependants excepted.
+
+The debates about proceeding at all had detained us so long, and the
+"one boiler" proved to be so powerless, that night set in, and we had
+not yet made the coast of France. The breeze had been fresh, but it
+lulled towards sunset, though not before we began to feel the influence
+of the tides. About midnight, however, I heard some one exclaim, "Land!"
+and we all hastened on deck, to take a first look at France.
+
+The boat was running along beneath some cliffs. The moon was shining
+bright, and her rays lighted up the chalky sides of the high coast,
+giving them a ghostly hue. The towers of two lighthouses also glittered
+on a headland near by. Presently a long sea-wall became visible, and,
+rounding its end, we shot into smooth water. We entered the little port
+of Havre between artificial works, on one of which stands a low,
+massive, circular tower, that tradition attributes to no less a
+personage than Julius Caesar.
+
+What a change in so short a time! On the other side of the Channel,
+beyond the usual demands for employment, which were made in a modest
+way, and the eternal "Thank'ee, sir," there was a quiet in the people
+that was not entirely free from a suspicion of surliness. Here every man
+seemed to have two voices, both of which he used as if with no other
+desire than to hear himself speak. Notwithstanding the hour, which was
+past midnight, the quay was well lined, and a dozen officials poured on
+board the boat to prevent our landing. Custom-house officers, gendarmes,
+with enormous hats, and female commissionaires, were counteracting each
+other at every turn. At length we were permitted to land, being ordered
+up to a building near by. Here the females were taken into a separate
+room, where their persons were examined by functionaries of their own
+sex for contraband goods! This process has been described to me as being
+to the last degree offensive and humiliating. My own person was
+respected, I know not, why, for we were herded like sheep. As we were
+without spot, at least so far as smuggling was concerned, we were soon
+liberated. All our effects were left in the office, and we were turned
+into the streets without even a rag but what we had on. This was an
+inauspicious commencement for a country so polished; and yet, when one
+comes to look at the causes, it is not easy to point out an alternative.
+It was our own fault that we came so late.
+
+The streets were empty, and the tall grey houses, narrow avenues, and
+the unaccustomed objects, presented a strange spectacle by the placid
+light of the moon. It appeared as if we had alighted in a different
+planet. Though fatigued and sleepy, the whole party would involuntarily
+stop to admire some novelty, and our march was straggling and irregular.
+One house refused us after another, and it soon became seriously a
+question whether the night was not to be passed in the open air. P----
+was less than three years old, and as we had a regular gradation from
+that age upward, our _debut_ in France promised to be anything but
+agreeable. The guide said his resources were exhausted, and hinted at
+the impossibility of getting in. Nothing but the inns was open, and at
+all these we were refused. At length I remembered that, in poring over
+an English guide-book, purchased in New York, a certain Hotel
+d'Angleterre had been recommended as the best house in Havre.
+"Savez-vous, mon ami, ou est l'Hotel d'Angleterre?"--"Ma fois, oui;
+c'est tout pres." This "ma fois, oui," was ominous, and the "c'est tout,
+pres," was more so still. Thither we went, however, and we were
+received. Then commenced the process of climbing. We ascended several
+stories, by a narrow crooked staircase, and were shown into rooms on the
+fifth floor.
+
+The floors were of waxed tiles, without carpets or mats, and the
+furniture was tawdry. We got into our beds, which fatigue could scarcely
+render it possible to endure, on account of the bugs. A more infernal
+night I never passed, and I have often thought since, how hazardous it
+is to trust to first impressions. This night, and one or two more passed
+at Havre, and one other passed between Rouen and Paris, were among the
+most uncomfortable I can remember; and yet if I were to name a country
+in which one would be the most certain to get a good and a clean bed, I
+think I should name France!
+
+The next morning I arose and went down the ladder, for it was little
+better, to the lower world. The servant wished to know if we intended to
+use the _table d'hote_, which he pronounced excellent. Curiosity induced
+me to look at the appliances. It was a dark, dirty and crowded room, and
+yet not without certain savoury smells. French cookery can even get the
+better of French dirt. It was the only place about the house, the kitchen
+excepted, where a tolerable smell was to be found, and I mounted to the
+upper regions in self-defence.
+
+An hour or two afterwards, the consul did me the favour to call. I
+apologized for the necessity of causing him to clamber up so high. "It
+is not a misfortune here," was the answer, "for the higher one is, the
+purer is the atmosphere;" and he was right enough. It was not necessary
+to explain that we were in an inferior house, and certainly everything
+was extremely novel. At breakfast, however, there was a sensible
+improvement. The linen was white as snow; we were served with silver
+forks--it was a breakfast _a la fourchette_--spotlessly clean napkins,
+excellent rolls, and delicious butter, to say nothing of _cotelettes_
+that appeared to have been cooked by magic. Your aunt and myself looked
+at each other with ludicrous satisfaction when we came to taste coffee,
+which happened to be precisely at the same instant. It was the first
+time either of us had ever tasted French coffee--it would scarcely be
+exaggeration to say, that either of us had ever tasted coffee at all. I
+have had many French cooks since; have lived years in the capital of
+France itself, but I could never yet obtain a servant who understood the
+secret of making _cafe au lait_, as it is made in most of the inns and
+_cafes_ of that country. The discrepancy between the excellence of the
+table and the abominations of the place struck them all, so forcibly,
+that the rest of the party did little else but talk about it. As for
+myself, I wished to do nothing but eat.
+
+I had now another specimen of national manners. It was necessary to get
+our luggage through the custom-house. The consul recommended a
+_commissionnaire_ to help me. "You are not to be surprised," he said,
+laughing, as he went away, "if I send you one in petticoats." In a few
+minutes, sure enough, one of the _beau sexe_ presented herself. Her name
+was Desiree, and an abler negotiator was never employed. She scolded,
+coaxed, advised, wrangled, and uniformly triumphed. The officers were
+more civil, by daylight, than we had found them under the influence of
+the moon, and our business was soon effected.
+
+W---- had brought with him a spy-glass. It was old and of little value,
+but it was an heir-loom of the family. It came from the Hall at C----n,
+and had become historical for its service in detecting deer, in the
+lake, during the early years of the settlement. This glass had
+disappeared. No inquiry could recover it. "Send for Desiree," said the
+consul. Desiree came, received her orders, and in half an hour the glass
+was restored. There was an oversight in not getting a passport, when we
+were about to quit Havre. The office hours were over, and the steam-boat
+could not wait. "Were is Desiree?" Desiree was made acquainted with the
+difficulty, and the passport was obtained. "Desiree, ou est Desiree?"
+cried some one in the crowd, that had assembled to see the Camilla start
+for England, the day after our arrival. "Here is an Englishman who is
+too late to get his passport _vised_," said this person to Desiree, so
+near me that I heard it all; "the boat goes in ten minutes--what is to
+be done?"--"_Ma foi_--it is too late!" "Try, _ma bonne_--it's a pity he
+should lose his passage--_voici_." The Englishman gave his fee. Desiree
+looked about her, and then taking the idler by the arm, she hurried him
+through the crowd, this way and that way, ending by putting him aboard
+without any passport at all. "It is too late to get one," she said; "and
+they can but send you back." He passed undetected. France has a plenty
+of these managing females, though Desiree is one of the cleverest of
+them all. I understood this woman had passed a year or two in England,
+expressly to fit herself for her present occupation, by learning the
+language.
+
+While engaged in taking our passages on board the steam-boat for Rouen,
+some one called me by name, in English. The sound of the most familiar
+words, in one's own language, soon get to be startling in a foreign
+country. I remember, on returning to England, after an absence of five
+years, that it was more than a week before I could persuade myself I was
+not addressed whenever a passer-by spoke suddenly. On the present
+occasion, I was called to by an old schoolboy acquaintance, Mr. H----r,
+who was a consul in England, but who had taken a house on what is called
+the _Cote_, a hill-side, just above Ingouville, a village at no great
+distance from the town. We went out to his pretty little cottage, which
+enjoyed a charming view. Indeed I should particularize this spot as the
+one which gave me the first idea of one species of distinctive European
+scenery. The houses cling to the declivity, rising above each other in a
+way that might literally enable one to toss a stone into his neighbour's
+chimney-top. They are of stone, but being whitewashed, and very
+numerous, they give the whole mountain-side the appearance of a pretty
+hamlet, scattered without order in the midst of gardens. Italy abounds
+with such little scenes; nor are they unfrequent in France, especially
+in the vicinity of towns; though whitened edifices are far from being
+the prevailing taste of that country.
+
+That evening we had an infernal clamour of drums in the principal street,
+which happened to be our own. There might have been fifty, unaccompanied
+by any wind instrument. The French do not use the fife, and when one is
+treated to the drum, it is generally in large potions, and nothing but
+drum. This is a relic of barbarism, and is quite unworthy of a musical
+age. There is more or less of it in all the garrisoned towns of Europe.
+You may imagine the satisfaction with which one listens to a hundred or
+two of these plaintive instruments, beat between houses six or eight
+stories high, in a narrow street, and with desperate perseverance! The
+object is to recall the troops to their quarters.
+
+Havre is a tide-harbour. In America, where there is, on an average, not
+more than five feet of rise and fall to the water of the sea, such a
+haven would, of course, be impracticable for large vessels. But the
+majority of the ports on the British Channel are of this character, and
+indeed a large portion of the harbours of Great Britain. Calais,
+Boulogne, Havre, and Dieppe, are all inaccessible at low water. The
+cliffs are broken by a large ravine, a creek makes up the gorge, or a
+small stream flows outward into the sea, a basin is excavated, the
+entrance is rendered safe by moles which project into deep water, and
+the town is crowded around this semi-artificial port as well as
+circumstances will allow. Such is, more or less, the history of them
+all. Havre, however, is in some measure an exception. It stands on a
+plain, that I should think had once been a marsh. The cliffs are near
+it, seaward, and towards the interior there are fine receding hills,
+leaving a sufficient site, notwithstanding, for a town of large
+dimensions.
+
+The port of Havre has been much improved of late years. Large basins have
+been excavated, and formed into regular wet docks. They are nearly in the
+centre of the town. The mole stretches out several hundred yards on that
+side of the entrance of the port which is next the sea. Here signals are
+regularly made to acquaint vessels in the offing with the precise number
+of feet that can be brought into the port. These signals are changed at
+the rise or fall of every foot, according to a graduated scale which is
+near the signal pole. At dead low water the entrance to the harbour, and
+the outer harbour itself, are merely beds of soft mud. Machines are kept
+constantly at work to deepen them.
+
+The ship from sea makes the lights, and judges of the state of the tide
+by the signals. She rounds the Mole-Head at the distance of fifty or
+sixty yards, and sails along a passage too narrow to admit another
+vessel, at the same moment, into the harbour. Here she finds from
+eighteen to twenty, or even twenty-four feet of water, according to
+circumstances. She is hauled up to the gates of a dock, which are opened
+at high water only. As the water falls, one gate is shut, and the
+entrance to the dock becomes a lock: vessels can enter, therefore, as
+long as there remains sufficient water in the outer harbour for a ship
+to float. If caught outside, however, she must lie in the mud until the
+ensuing tide.
+
+Havre is the sea-port of Paris, and is rapidly increasing in importance.
+There is a project for connecting the latter with the sea by a ship
+channel. Such a project is hardly suited to the French impulses, which
+imagine a thousand grand projects, but hardly ever convert any of them
+to much practical good. The opinions of the people are formed on habits
+of great saving, and it requires older calculations, greater familiarity
+with risks, and more liberal notions of industry, and, possibly, more
+capital than is commonly found in their enterprises, to induce the
+people to encounter the extra charges of these improvements, when they
+can have recourse to what, in their eyes, are simpler and safer means of
+making money. The government employs men of science, who conceive well;
+but their conceptions are but indifferently sustained by the average
+practical intellect of the country. In this particular France is the
+very converse of America.
+
+The project of making a sea-port of Paris, is founded on a principle
+that is radically wrong. It is easier to build a house on the sea-side,
+than to carry the sea into the interior. But the political economy of
+France, like that of nearly all the continental nations, is based on a
+false principle, that of forcing improvements. The intellects of the
+mass should first be acted on, and when the public mind is sufficiently
+improved to benefit by innovations, the public sentiment might be
+trusted to decide the questions of locality and usefulness. The French
+system looks to a concentration of everything in Paris. The political
+organization of the country favours such a scheme, and in a project of
+this sort, the interests of all the northern and western departments
+would be sacrificed to the interests of Paris. As for the departments
+east and south of Paris, they would in no degree be benefited by making
+a port of Paris, as goods would still have to be transshipped to reach
+them. A system of canals and railroads is much wanted in France, and
+most of all, a system of general instruction, to prepare the minds of
+the operatives to profit by such advantages. When I say that we are
+behind our facts in America, I do not mean in a physical, but in a moral
+sense. All that is visible and tangible is led by opinion; in all that
+is purely moral, the facts precede the notions of the people.
+
+I found, at a later day, many droll theories broached in France, more
+especially in the Chamber of Deputies, on the subject of our own great
+success in the useful enterprises. As is usual, in such cases, any
+reason but the true one was given. At the period of our arrival in
+Europe, the plan of connecting the great lakes with the Atlantic had
+just been completed, and the vast results were beginning to attract
+attention in Europe. At first, it was thought, as a matter of course,
+that engineers from the old world had been employed. This was disproved,
+and it was shown that they who laid out the work, however skilful they
+may have since become by practice, were at first little more than common
+American surveyors. Then the trifling cost was a stumbling-block, for
+labour was known to be far better paid in America than in Europe; and
+lastly, the results created astonishment. Several deputies affirmed that
+the cause of the great success was owing to the fact, that in America we
+trusted such things to private competition, whereas, in France, the
+government meddled with everything. But it was the state governments,
+(which indeed alone possess the necessary means and authority,) that had
+caused most of the American canals to be constructed. These political
+economists knew too little of other systems to apply a clever saying of
+their own--_Il y a de la Rochefoucald, et de la Rouchefoucald_. All
+governments do not wither what they touch.
+
+Some Americans have introduced steam-boats on the rivers of France, and
+on the lakes of Switzerland and Italy. We embarked in one, after passing
+two delectable nights at the Hotel d'Angleterre. The boat was a
+frail-looking thing, and so loaded with passengers, that it appeared
+actually to stagger under its freight. The Seine has a wide mouth, and a
+long ground-swell was setting in from the Channel. Our Parisian
+cockneys, of whom there were several on board, stood aghast. "Nous voici
+en pleine mer!" one muttered to the other, and the annals of that
+eventful voyage are still related, I make no question, to admiring
+auditors in the interior of France. The French make excellent seamen
+when properly trained; but I think, on the whole, they are more
+thoroughly landsmen than any people of my acquaintance, who possess a
+coast. There has been too much sympathy with the army to permit the
+mariners to receive a proper share of the public favour.
+
+The boat shaped her course diagonally across the broad current, directly
+for Honfleur. Here we first began to get an idea of the true points of
+difference between our own scenery and that of the continent of Europe,
+and chiefly of that of France. The general characteristics of England
+are not essentially different from those of America, after allowing for
+a much higher finish in the former, substituting hedges for fences, and
+stripping the earth of its forests. These, you may think, are, in
+themselves, grand points of difference, but they fall far short of those
+which render the continent of Europe altogether of a different nature.
+Of forest, there is vastly more in France than in England. But, with few
+exceptions, the fields are not separated by enclosures. The houses are
+of stone, or of wood, rough-cast. Honfleur, as we approached, had a grey
+distinctness that is difficult to describe. The atmosphere seemed
+visible, around the angles of the buildings, as in certain Flemish
+pictures, bringing out the fine old sombre piles from the depth of the
+view, in a way to leave little concealed, while nothing was meretricious
+or gaudy. At first, though we found these hues imposing, and even
+beautiful, we thought the view would have been gayer and more agreeable,
+had the tints been livelier; but a little use taught us that our tastes
+had been corrupted. On our return home every structure appeared flaring
+and tawdry. Even those of stone had a recent and mushroom air, besides
+being in colours equally ill suited to architecture or a landscape. The
+only thing of the sort in America which appeared venerable and of a
+suitable hue, after an absence of eight years, was our own family abode,
+and this, the despoiler, paint, had not defiled for near forty years.
+
+We discharged part of our cargo at Honfleur, but the boat was still
+greatly crowded. Fatigue and ill health rendered standing painful to
+A----, and all the benches were crowded. She approached a young girl of
+about eighteen, who occupied _three chairs_. On one she was seated; on
+another she had her feet; and the third held her _reticule_. Apologizing
+for the liberty, A---- asked leave to put the _reticule_ on the second
+chair, and to take the third for her own use. This request was refused!
+The selfishness created by sophistication and a factitious state of
+things renders such acts quite frequent, for it is more my wish to offer
+you distinctive traits of character than exceptions. This case of
+selfishness might have been a little stronger than usual, it is true,
+but similar acts are of daily occurrence, _out of society_, in France.
+_In society_, the utmost respect to the wants and feelings of others is
+paid, vastly more than with us; while, with us, it is scarcely too
+strong to say that such an instance of unfeeling selfishness could
+scarcely have occurred at all. We may have occasion to inquire into the
+causes of this difference in national manners hereafter.
+
+The Seine narrows at Quilleboeuf, about thirty miles from Havre, to the
+width of an ordinary European tide river. On a high bluff we passed a
+ruin, called _Tancarville_, which was formerly a castle of the De
+Montmorencies. This place was the cradle of one of William's barons; and
+an English descendant, I believe, has been ennobled by the title of Earl
+of Tankerville.
+
+Above Quilleboeuf the river becomes exceedingly pretty. It is crooked, a
+charm in itself, has many willowy islands, and here and there a grey
+venerable town is seated in the opening of the high hills which contract
+the view, with crumbling towers, and walls that did good service in the
+times of the old English and French wars. There were fewer seats than
+might have been expected, though we passed three or four. One near the
+waterside, of some size, was in the ancient French style, with avenues
+cut in formal lines, mutilated statues, precise and treeless terraces,
+and other elaborated monstrosities. These places are not entirely
+without a pretension to magnificence; but, considered in reference to
+what is desirable in landscape gardening, they are the very _laid ideal_
+of deformity. After winding our way for eight or ten hours amid such
+scenes, the towers of Rouen came in view. They had a dark ebony-coloured
+look, which did great violence to our Manhattanese notions, but which
+harmonized gloriously with a bluish sky, the grey walls beneath, and a
+background of hanging fields.
+
+Rouen is a sea-port; vessels of two hundred, or two hundred and fifty
+tons burden, lying at its quays. Here is also a custom-house, and our
+baggage was again opened for examination. This was done amid a great
+deal of noise and confusion, and yet so cursorily as to be of no real
+service. At Havre, landing as we did in the night, and committing all to
+Desiree the next day, I escaped collision with subordinates. But, not
+having a servant, I was now compelled to look after our effects in
+person. W---- protested that we had fallen among barbarians; what
+between brawls, contests for the trunks, cries, oaths, and snatching,
+the scene was equally provoking and comic.
+
+Without schooling, without training of any sort, little checked by
+morals, pressed upon by society, with nearly every necessary of life
+highly taxed, and yet entirely loosened from the deference of feudal
+manners, the Frenchmen of this class have, in general, become what they
+who wish to ride upon their fellow mortals love to represent them as
+being, truculent, violent, greedy of gain, and but too much disposed to
+exaction. There is great _bonhomie_ and many touches of chivalry in the
+national character; but it is asking too much to suppose that men who
+are placed in the situation I have named, should not exhibit some of the
+most unpleasant traits of human infirmity. Our trunks were put into a
+handbarrow, and wheeled by two men a few hundred yards, the whole
+occupying half an hour of time. For this service ten francs were
+demanded. I offered five, or double what would have been required by a
+drayman in New York, a place where labour is proverbially dear. This was
+disdainfully refused, and I was threatened with the law. Of the latter I
+knew nothing; but, determined not to be bullied into what I felt
+persuaded was an imposition, I threw down the five francs and walked
+away. These fellows kept prowling about the hotel the whole day,
+alternately wheedling and menacing, without success. Towards night one
+of them appeared, and returned the five francs, saying, that he gave me
+his services for nothing. I thanked him, and put the money in my pocket.
+This fit of dignity lasted about five minutes, when, as _finale_, I
+received a proposal to pay the money again, and bring the matter to a
+close, which was done accordingly.
+
+An Englishman of the same class would have done his work in silence,
+with a respect approaching to servility, and with a system that any
+little _contretems_ would derange. He would ask enough, take his money
+with a "thank 'ee, sir," and go off looking as surly as if he were
+dissatisfied. An American would do his work silently, but independently
+as to manner--but a fact will best illustrate the conduct of the
+American. The day after we landed at New-York, I returned to the ship
+for the light articles. They made a troublesome load, and filled a
+horse-cart. "What do you think I _ought_ to get for carrying this load,
+'sqire?" asked the cartman, as he looked at the baskets, umbrellas,
+band-boxes, valises, secretaries, trunks, etc. etc.; "it is quite two
+miles to Carroll Place." "It is, indeed; what is your fare?" "Only
+thirty-seven and a half cents;" (about two francs;) "and it is justly
+worth seventy-five, there is so much trumpery." "I will give you a
+dollar." "No more need be said, sir; you shall have everything safe." I
+was so much struck with this straight-forward manner of proceeding, after
+all I had undergone in Europe, that I made a note of it the same day.
+
+The Hotel de l'Europe, at Rouen, was not a first-rate inn, for France,
+but it effectually removed the disagreeable impression left by the Hotel
+d'Angleterre, at Havre. We were well lodged, well fed, and otherwise
+well treated. After ordering dinner, all of a suitable age hurried off
+to the cathedral.
+
+Rouen is an old, and by no means a well-built town. Some improvements
+along the river are on a large scale, and promise well; but the heart of
+the city is composed principally of houses of wooden frames, with the
+interstices filled in with cement. Work of this kind is very common in
+all the northern provincial towns of France. It gives a place a
+singular, and not altogether an unpicturesque air; the short dark studs
+that time has imbrowned, forming a sort of visible ribs to the houses.
+
+When we reached the little square in front of the cathedral, verily
+Henry the Seventh's chapel sunk into insignificance. I can only compare
+the effect of the chiselling on the quaint Gothic of this edifice, to
+that of an enormous skreen of dark lace, thrown into the form of a
+church. This was the first building of the kind that my companions had
+ever seen; and they had, insomuch, the advantage over me, as I had, in a
+degree, taken off the edge of wonder by the visit already mentioned to
+Westminster. The first look at this pile was one of inextricable
+details. It was not difficult to distinguish the vast and magnificent
+doors, and the beautiful oriel windows, buried as they were in ornament;
+but an examination was absolutely necessary to trace the little towers,
+pinnacles, and the crowds of pointed arches, amid such a scene of
+architectural confusion. "It is worth crossing the Atlantic, were it
+only to see this!" was the common feeling among us.
+
+It was some time before we discovered that divers dwellings had actually
+been built between the buttresses of the church, for their comparative
+diminutiveness, quaint style, and close incorporation with the pile,
+caused us to think them, at first, a part of the edifice itself. This
+desecration of the Gothic is of very frequent occurrence on the
+continent of Europe, taking its rise in the straitened limits of
+fortified towns, the cupidity of churchmen, and the general indifference
+to knowledge, and, consequently, to taste, which depressed the ages that
+immediately followed the construction of most of these cathedrals.
+
+We were less struck by the interior, than by the exterior of this
+building. It is vast, has some fine windows, and is purely Gothic; but
+after the richness of the external details, the aisles and the choir
+appeared rather plain. It possessed, however, in some of its monuments,
+subjects of great interest to those who had never stood over a grave of
+more than two centuries, and rarely even over one of half that age. Among
+other objects of this nature, is the heart of Coeur de Lion, for the
+church was commenced in the reign of one of his predecessors; Normandy at
+that time belonging to the English kings, and claiming to be the
+depository of the "lion heart."
+
+Rouen has many more memorials of the past. We visited the square in
+which Joan of Arc was burned; a small irregular area in front of her
+prison; the prison itself, and the hall in which she had been condemned.
+All these edifices are Gothic, quaint, and some of them sufficiently
+dilapidated.
+
+I had forgotten to relate, in its place, a fact, as an offset to the
+truculent garrulity of the porters. We were shown round the cathedral by
+a respectable-looking old man in a red scarf, a cocked hat, and a
+livery, one of the officers of the place. He was respectful, modest, and
+well instructed in his tale. The tone of this good old cicerone was so
+much superior to anything I had seen in England--in America such a
+functionary is nearly unknown--that, under the influence of our national
+manners, I had awkward doubts as to the propriety of offering him money.
+At length the five francs rescued from the cupidity of the
+half-civilized peasants of _la basse Normandie_ were put into his hand.
+A look of indecision caused me to repent the indiscretion. I thought his
+feelings had been wounded. "Est-ce que monsieur compte me presenter tout
+ceci?" I told him I hoped he would do me the favour to accept it. I had
+only given _more_ than was usual, and the honesty of the worthy cicerone
+hesitated about taking it. To know when to pay, and what to pay, is a
+useful attainment of the experienced traveller.
+
+Paris lay before us, and, although Rouen is a venerable and historical
+town, we were impatient to reach the French capital. A carriage was
+procured, and, on the afternoon of the second day, we proceeded.
+
+After quitting Rouen the road runs, for several miles, at the foot of
+high hills, and immediately on the banks of the Seine. At length we were
+compelled to climb the mountain which terminates near the city, and
+offers one of the noblest views in France, from a point called St.
+Catherine's Hill. We did not obtain so fine a prospect from the road,
+but the view far surpassed anything we had yet seen in Europe. Putting
+my head out of the window, when about half way up the ascent, I saw an
+object booming down upon us, at the rate of six or eight miles the hour,
+that resembled in magnitude at least a moving house. It was a diligence,
+and being the first we had met, it caused a general sensation in our
+party. Our heads were in each other's way, and finding it impossible to
+get a good view in any other manner, we fairly alighted in the highway,
+old and young, to look at the monster unincumbered. Our admiration and
+eagerness caused as much amusement to the travellers it held, as their
+extraordinary equipage gave rise to among us; and two merrier parties
+did not encounter each other on the public road that day.
+
+A proper diligence is formed of a chariot-body, and two coach-bodies
+placed one before the other, the first in front. These are all on a
+large scale, and the wheels and train are in proportion. On the roof
+(the three bodies are closely united) is a cabriolet, or covered seat,
+and baggage is frequently piled there, many feet in height. A large
+leathern apron covers the latter. An ordinary load of hay, though wider,
+is scarcely of more bulk than one of these vehicles, which sometimes
+carries twenty-five or thirty passengers, and two or three tons of
+luggage. The usual team is composed of five horses, two of which go on
+the pole, and three on the lead, the latter turning their heads
+outwards, as W---- remarked, so as to resemble a spread eagle.
+Notwithstanding the weight, these carriages usually go down a hill
+faster than when travelling on the plain. A bar of wood is brought, by
+means of a winch that is controlled by a person called the _conducteur_,
+one who has charge of both ship and cargo, to bear on the hind wheels,
+with a greater or less force, according to circumstances, so that all
+the pressure is taken off the wheel horses. A similar invention has
+latterly been applied to railroad cars. I have since gone over this
+very road with ten horses, two on the wheel, and eight in two lines on
+the lead. On that occasion, we came down this very hill, at the rate of
+nine miles the hour.
+
+After amusing ourselves with the spectacle of the diligence, we found the
+scenery too beautiful to re-enter the carriage immediately, and we walked
+to the top of the mountain. The view from the summit was truly admirable.
+The Seine comes winding its way through a broad rich valley, from the
+southward, having just before run east, and, a league or two beyond due
+west, our own Susquehanna being less crooked. The stream was not broad,
+but its numerous isles, willowy banks, and verdant meadows, formed a line
+for the eye to follow. Rouen in the distance, with its ebony towers,
+fantastic roofs, and straggling suburbs, lines its shores, at a curvature
+where the stream swept away west again, bearing craft of the sea on its
+bosom. These dark old towers have a sombre, mysterious air, which
+harmonizes admirably with the recollections that crowd the mind at such a
+moment! Scarce an isolated dwelling was to be seen, but the dense
+population is compressed into villages and _bourgs_, that dot the view,
+looking brown and teeming, like the nests of wasps. Some of these places
+have still remains of walls, and most of them are so compact and well
+defined that they appear more like vast castles than like the villages of
+England or America. All are grey, sombre, and without glare, rising from
+the background of pale verdure, so many appropriate _bas reliefs_.
+
+The road was strewed with peasants of both sexes, wending their way
+homeward, from the market of Rouen. One, a tawny woman, with no other
+protection for her head than a high but perfectly clean cap, was going
+past us, driving an ass, with the panniers loaded with manure. We were
+about six miles from the town, and the poor beast, after staggering some
+eight or ten miles to the market in the morning, was staggering back
+with this heavy freight, at even. I asked the woman, who, under the
+circumstances, could not be a resident of one of the neighbouring
+villages, the name of a considerable _bourg_ that lay about a gun-shot
+distant, in plain view, on the other side of the river. "Monsieur, je ne
+saurais pas vous dire, parce que, voyez-vous, je ne suis pas de ce
+pays-la," was the answer!
+
+Knowledge is the parent of knowledge. He who possesses most of the
+information of his age will not quietly submit to neglect its current
+acquisitions, but will go on improving as long as means and
+opportunities offer; while he who finds himself ignorant of most things,
+is only too apt to shrink from a labour which becomes Herculean. In this
+manner ambition is stifled, the mind gets to be inactive, and finally
+sinks into unresisting apathy. Such is the case with a large portion of
+the European peasantry. The multitude of objects that surround them
+becomes a reason of indifference; and they pass, from day to day, for a
+whole life, in full view of a town, without sufficient curiosity in its
+history to inquire its name, or, if told by accident, sufficient
+interest to remember it. We see this principle exemplified daily in
+cities. One seldom thinks of asking the name of a passer-by, though he
+may be seen constantly; whereas, in the country, such objects being
+comparatively rare, the stranger is not often permitted to appear
+without some question touching his character.[3]
+
+[Footnote 3: When in London, two years later, I saw a gentleman of rather
+striking appearance pass my door for two months, five or six times of a
+morning. Remembering the apathy of the Norman peasant, I at length asked
+who it was--"Sir Francis Burdett," was the answer.]
+
+I once inquired of a servant girl, at a French inn, who might be the
+owner of a chateau near by, the gate of which was within a hundred feet
+of the house we were in. She was unable to say, urging, as an apology,
+that she had only been six weeks in her present place! This, too, was in
+a small country hamlet. I think every one must have remarked, _coeteris
+paribus_, how much more activity and curiosity of mind is displayed by a
+countryman who first visits a town, than by the dweller in a city who
+first visits the country. The first wishes to learn everything, since be
+has been accustomed to understand everything he has hitherto seen; while
+the last, accustomed to a crowd of objects, usually regards most of the
+novel things he now sees for the first time with indifference.
+
+The road, for the rest of the afternoon, led us over hills and plains,
+from one reach of the river to another, for we crossed the latter
+repeatedly before reaching Paris. The appearance of the country was
+extraordinary in our eyes. Isolated houses were rare, but villages
+dotted the whole expanse. No obtrusive colours; but the eye had
+frequently to search against the hill-side, or in the valley, and, first
+detecting a mass, it gradually took in the picturesque angles, roofs,
+towers, and walls of the little _bourg_. Not a fence, or visible
+boundary of any sort, to mark the limits of possessions. Not a hoof in
+the fields grazing, and occasionally, a sweep of mountain-land resembled
+a pattern-card, with its stripes of green and yellow, and other hues,
+the narrow fields of the small proprietors. The play of light and shade
+on these gay upland patches though not strictly in conformity with the
+laws of taste, certainly was attractive. When they fell entirely into
+shadow, the harvest being over, and their gaudy colours lessened, they
+resembled the melancholy and wasted vestiges of a festival.
+
+At Louviers we dined, and there we found a new object of wonder in the
+church. It was of the Gothic of the _bourgs_, less elaborated and more
+rudely wrought than that of the larger towns, but quaint, and, the
+population considered, vast. Ugly dragons thrust out their grinning
+heads at us from the buttresses. The most agreeable monstrosities
+imaginable were crawling along the grey old stones. After passing this
+place, the scenery lost a good deal of the pastoral appearance which
+renders Normandy rather remarkable in France, and took still more of the
+starched pattern-card look, just mentioned. Still it was sombre, the
+villages were to be extracted by the eye from their setting of fields,
+and here and there one of those "silent fingers pointing to the skies"
+raised itself into the air, like a needle, to prick the consciences of
+the thoughtless. The dusky hues of all the villages contrasted oddly,
+and not unpleasantly, with the carnival colours of the grains.
+
+We slept at Vernon, and, before retiring for the night, passed half an
+hour in a fruitless attempt to carry by storm a large old circular tower,
+that is imputed to the inexhaustible industry of Caesar. This was the
+third of his reputed works that we had seen since landing in France. In
+this part of Europe, Caesar has the credit of everything for which no one
+else is willing to apply, as is the case with Virgil at Naples.
+
+It was a sensation to rise in the morning with the rational prospect of
+seeing Paris, for the first time in one's life, before night. In my
+catalogue it stands numbered as sensation the 5th; Westminster, the
+night arrival in France, and the Cathedral of Rouen, giving birth to
+numbers 1, 2, and 4. Though accustomed to the tattoo, and the evening
+bugle of a man-of-war, the drums of Havre had the honour of number 3.
+Alas! how soon we cease to feel those agreeable excitements at all, even
+a drum coming in time to pall on the ear!
+
+Near Vernon we passed a village, which gave us the first idea of one
+feature in the old _regime_. The place was grey, sombre, and
+picturesque, as usual, in the distance; but crowded, dirty,
+inconvenient, and mean, when the eye got too near. Just without the
+limits of its nuisances stood the chateau, a regular pile of hewn stone,
+with formal _allees_, abundance of windows, extensive stables, and
+broken vases. The ancient _seigneur_ probably retained no more of this
+ancient possession than its name, while some Monsieur Le Blanc, or
+Monsieur Le Noir, filled his place in the house, and "personne dans la
+seigneurie."
+
+A few leagues farther brought us to an eminence, whence we got a
+beautiful glimpse of the sweeping river, and of a wide expanse of
+fertile country less formally striped and more picturesque than the
+preceding. Another grey castellated town lay on the verge of the river,
+with towers that seemed even darker than ever. How different was all
+this from the glare of our own objects! As we wound round the brow of
+the height, extensive park-grounds, a village more modern, less
+picturesque, and less dirty than common, with a large chateau in red
+bricks, was brought in sight, in the valley. This was Rosny, the place
+that gave his hereditary title to the celebrated Sully, as Baron and
+Marquis de Rosny; Sully, a man, who, like Bacon, almost deserves the
+character so justly given of the latter by Pope, that of "The wisest,
+greatest, _meanest_, of mankind." The house and grounds were now the
+property of Madame, as it is the etiquette to term the Duchesse de
+Berri. The town in the distance, with the dark towers, was Mantes, a
+place well known in the history of Normandy. We breakfasted at Le Cheval
+Blanc. The church drew us all out, but it was less monstrous than that
+of Louviers, and, as a cathedral, unworthy to be named with those of the
+larger places.
+
+The next stage brought us to St. Germain-en-Laye, or to the verge of the
+circle of low mountains that surround the plains of Paris. Here we got
+within the influence of royal magnificence and the capital. The
+Bourbons, down to the period of the revolution, were indeed kings, and
+they have left physical and moral impressions of their dynasty of seven
+hundred years, that will require as long a period to eradicate. Nearly
+every foot of the entire semi-circle of hills to the west of Paris is
+historical, and garnished by palaces, pavilions, forests, parks,
+aqueducts, gardens, or chases. A carriage terrace, of a mile in length,
+and on a most magnificent scale in other respects, overlooks the river,
+at an elevation of several hundred feet above its bed. The palace
+itself, a quaint old edifice of the time of Francis I, who seems to have
+had an architecture not unlike that of Elizabeth of England, has long
+been abandoned as a royal abode. I believe its last royal occupant was
+the dethroned James II. It is said to have been deserted by its owners,
+because it commands a distant view of that silent monitor, the sombre
+beautiful spire of St. Denis, whose walls shadow the vaults of the
+Bourbons; they who sat on a throne not choosing to be thus constantly
+reminded of the time when they must descend to the common fate and
+crumbling equality of the grave.
+
+An aqueduct, worthy of the Romans, gave an imposing idea of the scale on
+which these royal works were conducted. It appeared, at the distance of
+a league or two, a vast succession of arches, displaying a broader range
+of masonry than I had ever before seen. So many years had passed since I
+was last in Europe, that I gazed in wonder at its vastness.
+
+From St. Germain we plunged into the valley, and took our way towards
+Paris, by a broad paved avenue, that was bordered with trees. The road
+now began to show an approach to a capital, being crowded with all sorts
+of uncouth-looking vehicles, used as public conveyances. Still it was on
+a Lilliputian scale as compared to London, and semi-barbarous even as
+compared to one of our towns. Marly-la-Machine was passed; an hydraulic
+invention to force water up the mountains to supply the different
+princely dwellings of the neighbourhood. Then came a house of no great
+pretension, buried in trees, at the foot of the bill. This was the
+celebrated consular abode, Malmaison. After this we mounted to a hamlet,
+and the road stretched away before us, with the river between, to the
+unfinished Arc de l'Etoile, or the barrier of the capital. The evening
+was soft, and there had been a passing shower. As the mist drove away, a
+mass rose like a glittering beacon, beyond the nearest hill, proclaiming
+Paris. It was the dome of the Hotel of the Invalids!
+
+Though Paris possesses better points of view from its immediate vicinity
+than most capitals, it is little seen from any of its ordinary
+approaches until fairly entered. We descended to the river by a gentle
+declivity. The chateau and grounds of Neuilly, a private possession of
+the Duke of Orleans, lay on our left; the Bois de Boulogne, the carriage
+promenade of the capital, on our right. We passed one of those
+abortions, a _magnificent_ village, (Neuilly,) and ascended gently
+towards the unfinished Arch of the Star. Bending around this imposing
+memorial of--Heaven knows what! for it has had as many destinations as
+France has had governors--we entered the iron gate of the barrier, and
+found ourselves within the walls of Paris.
+
+We were in the Avenue de Neuilly. The Champs Elysees, without verdure, a
+grove divided by the broad approach, and moderately peopled by a
+well-dressed crowd, lay on each side. In front, at the distance of a
+mile, was a mass of foliage that looked more like a rich copse in park
+than an embellishment of a town garden; and above this, again, peered
+the pointed roofs of two or three large and high members of some vast
+structure, sombre in colour and quaint in form. They were the pavilions
+of the Tuileries.[4] A line of hotels became visible through trees and
+shrubbery on the left, and on the right we soon got evidence that we
+were again near the river. We had just left it behind us, and after a
+_detour_ of several leagues, here it was again flowing in our front,
+cutting in twain the capital.
+
+[Footnote 4: Tuileries is derived from _Tuile_, or tile; the site of the
+present gardens having been a tile-yard.]
+
+Objects now grew confused, for they came fast. We entered and crossed a
+paved area, that lay between the Seine, the Champs Elysees, the garden
+of the Tuileries, and two little palaces of extraordinary beauty of
+architecture. This was the place where Louis XVI. and his unfortunate
+wife were beheaded. Passing between the two edifices last named, we came
+upon the Boulevards, and plunged at once into the street-gaiety and
+movement of this remarkable town.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER V.
+
+Paris in August 1826.--Montmartre.--The Octroi.--View of Paris.
+--Montmorency.--Royal Residences.--Duke of Bordeaux.--Horse-racing.
+--The Dauphine.--Popular feeling in Paris.--Royal Equipage.--Gardes du
+Corps.--Policy of Napoleon.--Centralization.
+
+
+To R COOPER, ESQ., COOPERSTOWN.
+
+We were not a fortnight in Paris before we were quietly established, _en
+bourgeois_, in the Faubourg St. Germain. Then followed the long and
+wearying toil of sight-seeing. Happily, our time was not limited, and we
+took months for that which is usually performed in a few days. This
+labour is connected with objects that description has already rendered
+familiar, and I shall say nothing of them, except as they may
+incidentally belong to such parts of my subject as I believe worthy to
+be noticed.
+
+Paris was empty in the month of August 1826. The court was at St. Cloud;
+the Duchesse de Berri at her favourite Dieppe; and the fashionable world
+was scattered abroad over the face of Europe. Our own minister was at
+the baths of Aix, in Savoy.
+
+One of the first things was to obtain precise and accurate ideas of the
+position and _entourage_ of the place. In addition to those enjoyed from
+its towers, there are noble views of Paris from Montmartre and Pere
+Lachaise. The former has the best look-out, and thither we proceeded.
+This little mountain is entirely isolated, forming no part of the
+exterior circle of heights which environ the town. It lies north of the
+walls, which cross its base. The ascent is so steep as to require a
+winding road, and the summit, a table of a hundred acres, is crowned by
+a crowded village, a church, and divers windmills. There was formerly a
+convent or two, and small country-houses still cling to its sides,
+buried in the shrubbery that clothe their terraces.
+
+We were fortunate in our sky, which was well veiled in clouds, and
+occasionally darkened by mists. A bright sun may suit particular scenes,
+and peculiar moods of the mind, but every connoisseur in the beauties of
+nature will allow that, as a rule, clouds, and very frequently a partial
+obscurity, greatly aid a landscape. This is yet more true of a
+bird's-eye view of a grey old mass of walls, which give up their
+confused and dusky objects all the better for the absence of glare. I
+love to study a place teeming with historical recollections, under this
+light; leaving the sites of memorable scenes to issue, one by one, out
+of the grey mass of gloom, as time gives up its facts from the obscurity
+of ages.
+
+Unlike English and American towns, Paris has scarcely any suburbs. Those
+parts which are called its Faubourgs are, in truth, integral parts of
+the city; and, with the exception of a few clusters of winehouses and
+_guinguettes_, which have collected near its gates to escape the city
+duties, the continuity of houses ceases suddenly with the _barrieres_,
+and, at the distance of half a mile from the latter, one is as
+effectually in the country, so far as the eye is concerned, as if a
+hundred leagues in the provinces. The unfenced meadows, vineyards,
+lucerne, oats, wheat, and vegetables, in many places, literally reach
+the walls. These walls are not intended for defence, but are merely a
+financial _enceinte_, created for offensive operations against the
+pockets of the inhabitants. Every town in France that has two thousand
+inhabitants is entitled to set up an _octroi_ on its articles of
+consumption, and something like four millions of dollars are taken
+annually at the gates of Paris, in duties on this internal trade. It is
+merely the old expedient to tax the poor, by laying impositions on food
+and necessaries.
+
+From the windmills of Montmartre, the day we ascended, the eye took in
+the whole vast capital at a glance. The domes sprung up through the
+mist, like starling balloons; and here and there the meandering stream
+threw back a gleam of silvery light. Enormous roofs denoted the sites of
+the palaces, churches, or theatres. The summits of columns, the crosses
+of the minor churches, and the pyramids of pavilion tops, seemed
+struggling to rear their heads from out the plain of edifices. A better
+idea of the vastness of the principal structures was obtained here in
+one hour, than could be got from the streets in a twelvemonth. Taking
+the roofs of the palace, for instance, the eye followed its field of
+slate and lead through a parallelogram for quite a mile. The sheet of
+the French opera resembled a blue pond, and the aisles of Notre Dame and
+St. Eustache, with their slender ribs and massive buttresses, towered so
+much above the lofty houses around them, as to seem to stand on their
+ridges. The church of St. Genevieve, the Pantheon of the revolution,
+faced us on the swelling land of the opposite side of the town, but
+surrounded still with crowded lines of dwellings; the Observatory
+limiting equally the view, and the vast field of houses in that
+direction.
+
+Owing to the state of the atmosphere, and the varying light, the picture
+before us was not that simply of a town, but, from the multiplicity and
+variety of its objects, it was a vast and magnificent view. I have
+frequently looked at Paris since from the same spot, or from its church
+towers, when the strong sunlight reduced it to the appearance of confused
+glittering piles, on which the eye almost refused to dwell; but, in a
+clouded day, all the peculiarities stand out sombre and distinct,
+resembling the grey accessories of the ordinary French landscape.
+
+From the town we turned to the heights which surround it. East and
+south-east, after crossing the Seine, the country lay in the waste-like
+unfenced fields which characterize the scenery of this part of Europe.
+Roads stretched away in the direction of Orleans, marked by the usual
+lines of clipped and branchless trees. More to the west commence the
+abrupt heights, which, washed by the river, enclose nearly half the wide
+plain, like an amphitheatre. This has been the favourite region of the
+kings of France, from the time of Louis XIII. down to the present day.
+The palaces of Versailles, St. Germain, St. Cloud, and Meudon, all lie
+in this direction, within short distances of the capital; and the royal
+forests, avenues, and chases intersect it in every direction, as
+mentioned before.
+
+Farther north, the hills rise to be low mountains, though a wide and
+perfectly level plain spreads itself between the town and their bases,
+varying in breadth from two to four leagues. On the whole of this
+expanse of cultivated fields, there was hardly such a thing as an
+isolated house. Though not literally true, this fact was so nearly so as
+to render the effect oddly peculiar, when one stood on the eastern
+extremity of Montmartre, where, by turning southward, he looked down
+upon the affluence and heard the din of a vast capital, and by turning
+northward, he beheld a country with all the appliances of rural life,
+and dotted by grey villages. Two places, however, were in sight, in this
+direction, that might aspire to be termed towns. One was St. Denis, from
+time immemorial the burying-place of the French kings; and the other was
+Montmorency, the _bourg_ which gives its name to, or receives it from,
+the illustrious family that is so styled; for I am unable to say which
+is the fact. The church spire of the former is one of the most beautiful
+objects in view from Montmartre, the church itself, which was desecrated
+in the revolution, having been restored by Napoleon. St. Denis is
+celebrated, in the Catholic annals, by the fact of the martyr, from whom
+the name is derived, having walked after decapitation, with his head
+under his arm, all the way from Paris to this very spot.
+
+Montmorency is a town of no great size or importance, but lying on the
+side of a respectable mountain, in a way to give the spectator more than
+a profile, it appears to be larger than it actually is. This place is
+scarcely distinguishable from Paris, under the ordinary light; but on a
+day like that which we had chosen, it stood out in fine relief from the
+surrounding fields, even the grey mass of its church being plainly
+visible. If Paris is so beautiful and striking when seen from the
+surrounding heights, there are many singularly fine pictures in the
+bosom of the place itself. We rarely crossed the Pont Royal, during the
+first month or two of our residence, without stopping the carriage to
+gaze at the two remarkable views it offers. One is up the reach of the
+Seine which stretches through the heart of the town, separated by the
+island; and the other, in an opposite direction, looks down the reach by
+which the stream flows into the meadows, on its way to the sea. The
+first is a look into the avenues of a large town, the eye resting on the
+quaint outlines and endless mazes of walls, towers, and roofs; while the
+last is a prospect, in which the front of the picture is a collection of
+some of the finest objects of a high state of civilization, and the
+background a beautiful termination of wooded and decorated heights.
+
+At first, one who is accustomed to the forms and movements of a sea-port
+feels a little disappointment at seeing a river that bears nothing but
+dingy barges loaded with charcoal and wine-casks. The magnificence of
+the quays seems disproportioned to the trifling character of the
+commerce they are destined to receive. But familiarity with the town
+soon changes all these notions, and while we admit that Paris is
+altogether secondary, so far as trade is concerned, we come to feel the
+magnificence of her public works, and to find something that is pleasing
+and picturesque, even in her huge and unwieldy wood and coal barges.
+Trade is a good thing in its way, but its agents rarely contribute to
+the taste, learning, manners, or morals of a nation.
+
+The sight of the different interesting objects that encircle Paris
+stimulated our curiosity to nearer views, and we proceeded immediately
+to visit the environs. These little excursions occupied more than a
+month, and they not only made us familiar with the adjacent country,
+but, by compelling us to pass out at nearly every one of the twenty or
+thirty different gates or barriers, as they are called, with a large
+portion of the town also. This capital has been too often described to
+render any further account of the principal objects necessary, and in
+speaking of it, I shall endeavour to confine my remarks to things that I
+think may still interest you by their novelty.
+
+The royal residences in Paris at this time are, strictly speaking, but
+two,--the Tuileries and the Palais Royal. The Louvre is connected with
+the first, and it has no finished apartments that are occupied by any of
+princely rank, most of its better rooms being unfinished, and are
+occupied as cabinets or museums. A small palace, called the Elysee
+Bourbon, is fitted up as a residence for the heir presumptive, the Duc
+de Bordeaux; but, though it contains his princely toys, such as
+miniature batteries of artillery, etc., he is much too young to maintain
+a separate establishment. This little scion of royalty only completed
+his seventh year not long after our arrival in France; on which occasion
+one of those silly ceremonies, which some of the present age appear to
+think inseparable from sound principles, was observed. The child was
+solemnly and formally transferred from the care of the women to that of
+the men. Up to this period, Madame la Vicomtesse de Gontaut-Biron had
+been his governess, and she now resigned her charge into the hands of
+the Baron de Damas, who had lately been Minister of Foreign Affairs.
+Madame de Gontaut was raised to the rank of Duchess on the occasion. The
+boy himself is said to have passed from the hands of the one party to
+those of the other, in presence of the whole court, _absolutely naked_.
+Some such absurdity was observed at the reception of Marie Antoinette,
+it being a part of regal etiquette that a royal bride, on entering
+France, should leave her old wardrobe, even to the last garment, behind
+her. You will be amused to hear that there are people in Europe who
+still attach great importance to a rigid adherence to all the old
+etiquette at similar ceremonies. These are the men who believe it to be
+essential that judges and advocates should wear wigs, in an age when,
+their use being rejected by the rest of the world, their presence cannot
+fail, if it excite any feeling, to excite that of inconvenience and
+absurdity. There is such a thing as leaving society too naked, I admit;
+but a _chemise_, at least, could not have injured the little Duke of
+Bordeaux at this ceremony. Whenever a usage that is poetical in itself,
+and which awakens a sentiment without doing violence to decency, or
+comfort, or common sense, can be preserved, I would rigidly adhere to
+it, if it were only for antiquity's sake; but, surely, it would be far
+more rational for judges to wear false beards, because formerly Bacon
+and Coke did not shave their chins, than it is for a magistrate to
+appear on the bench with a cumbrous, hot, and inconvenient cloud of
+powdered flax, or whatever may be the material on his poll, because our
+ancestors, a century or two since, were so silly as to violate nature in
+the same extraordinary manner.
+
+Speaking of the Duke of Bordeaux, reminds me of an odd, and, indeed, in
+some degree a painful scene, of which I was accidentally a witness, a
+short time before the ceremony just mentioned. The _emigres_ have
+brought back with them into France a taste for horse-racing, and,
+supported by a few of the English who are here, there are regular races,
+spring and autumn, in the Champs de Mars. The course is one of the
+finest imaginable, being more than a mile in circumference, and
+surrounded by mounds of earth, raised expressly with that object, which
+permit the spectators to overlook the entire field. The result is a
+species of amphitheatric arena, in which any of the dramatic
+exhibitions, that are so pleasing to this spectacle-loving nation, may
+be enacted. Pavilions are permanently erected at the starting-post, and
+one or two of these are usually fitted up for the use of the court,
+whenever it is the pleasure of the royal family to attend, as was the
+case at the time the little occurrence I am about to relate took place.
+
+On this occasion Charles X. came in royal state, from St. Cloud,
+accompanied by detachments of his guards, many carriages, several of
+which were drawn by eight horses, and a cloud of mounted footmen. Most
+of the dignitaries of the kingdom were present, in the different
+pavilions, or stands, and nearly or quite all the ministers, together
+with the whole diplomatic corps. There could not have been less than a
+hundred thousand spectators on the mounds.
+
+The racing itself was no great matter, being neither within time nor
+well contested. The horses were all French, the trial being intended for
+the encouragement of the French breeders, and the sports were yet too
+recent to have produced much influence on the stock of the country.
+During the heats, accompanied by a young American friend, I had strolled
+among the royal equipages, in order to examine their magnificence, and
+returning towards the course, we came out unexpectedly at a little open
+space, immediately at one end of the pavilion in which the royal family
+was seated. There were not a dozen people near us, and one of these was
+a sturdy Englishman, evidently a tradesman, who betrayed a keen and a
+truly national desire to get a look at the king. The head of a little
+girl was just visible above the side of the pavilion, and my companion,
+who, by a singular accident, not long before, had been thrown into
+company with _les enfans de France_, as the royal children are called,
+informed me that it was Mademoiselle d'Artois, the sister of the heir
+presumptive. He had given me a favourable account of the children, whom
+he represented as both lively and intelligent, and I changed my position
+a little, to get a better look of the face of this little personage, who
+was not twenty feet from the spot where we stood. My movement attracted
+her attention; and, after looking down a moment into the small area in
+which we were enclosed, she disappeared. Presently a lady looked over
+the balustrade, and our Englishman seemed to be on tenter-hooks. Some
+thirty or forty French gathered round us immediately, and I presume it
+was thought none but loyal subjects could manifest so much desire to
+gaze at the family, especially as one or two of the French clapped the
+little princess, whose head now appeared and disappeared again, as if
+she were earnestly pressing something on the attention of those within
+the pavilion. In a moment the form of a pale and sickly-looking boy was
+seen, the little girl, who was a year or two older, keeping her place at
+his side. The boy was raised on the knee of a melancholy-looking and
+rather hard-featured female of fifty, who removed his straw hat in order
+to salute us. "These are the Dauphine and the Duc de Bordeaux,"
+whispered my companion, who knew the person of the former by sight. The
+Dauphine looked anxiously, and I thought mournfully, at the little
+cluster we formed directly before her, as if waiting to observe in what
+manner her nephew would be received. Of course my friend and myself, who
+were in the foreground, stood uncovered; as gentlemen we could not do
+less, nor as _foreign_ gentlemen could we very well do more. Not a
+Frenchman, however, even touched his hat! On the other hand, the
+Englishman straddled his legs, gave a wide sweep with his beaver, and
+uttered as hearty a hurrah as if he had been cheering a member of
+parliament who gave gin in his beer. The effect of this single,
+unaccompanied, unanswered cheer, was both ludicrous and painful. The
+poor fellow himself seemed startled at hearing his own voice amid so
+profound a stillness, and checking his zeal as unexpectedly as he had
+commenced its exhibition, he looked furiously around him and walked
+surlily away. The Dauphine followed him with her eyes. There was no
+mistaking his gaitered limbs, dogged mien, and florid countenance; be
+clearly was not French, and those that were, as clearly turned his
+enthusiasm into ridicule. I felt sorry for her, as, with a saddened
+face, she set down the boy, and withdrew her own head within the
+covering of the pavilion. The little Mademoiselle d'Artois kept her
+bright looks, in a sort of wonder, on us, until the circumspection of
+those around her, gave her a hint to disappear.
+
+This was the first direct and near view I got of the true state of
+popular feeling in Paris towards the reigning family. According to the
+journals in the interest of the court, enthusiasm was invariably
+exhibited whenever any of their princes appeared in public; but the
+journals in every country, our own dear and shrewd republic not
+excepted, are very unsafe guides for those who desire truth.
+
+I am told that the style of this court has been materially altered, and
+perhaps improved, by the impetuous character of Napoleon. The king
+rarely appears in public with less than eight horses, which are usually
+in a foam. His liveries are not showy, neither are the carriages as neat
+and elegant as one would expect. The former are blue and white, with a
+few slight ornaments of white and red lace, and the vehicles are showy,
+large and even magnificent, but, I think, without good taste. You will
+be surprised to hear that he drives with what in America we call "Dutch
+collars." Six of the horses are held in hand, and the leaders are
+managed by a postilion. There is always one or more empty carriages,
+according to the number of the royal personages present, equipped in
+every respect like those which are filled, and which are held in reserve
+against accidents; a provision, by the way, that is not at all
+unreasonable in those who scamper over the broken pavements, in and
+about Paris, as fast as leg can be put to the ground.
+
+Notwithstanding the present magnificence of the court, royalty is shorn
+of much of its splendour in France, since the days of Louis XVI. Then a
+city of a hundred thousand souls (Versailles) was a mere dependant of
+the crown; lodgings for many hundred _abbes_, it is said, were provided
+in the palace alone, and a simple representation at the palace opera
+cost a fortune.
+
+It is not an easy matter to come at the real cost of the kingly office
+in this country, all the expenditures of the European governments being
+mystified in such a way, as to require a very intimate knowledge of the
+details to give a perfectly clear account of them. But, so far as I have
+been able to ascertain, the charges that arise from this feature of the
+system do not fall much short, if indeed they do any, of eight millions
+of dollars annually. Out of this sum, however, the king pays the extra
+allowances of his guards, the war office taking the same view of all
+classes of soldiers, after distinguishing between foot and cavalry. You
+will get an idea of the luxury of royalty by a short account of the
+_gardes du corps_. These troops are all officers, the privates having
+the rank and receiving the pay of lieutenants. Their duty, as the name
+implies, is to have the royal person in their especial care, and there
+is always a guard of them in an ante-chamber of the royal apartments.
+They are heavy cavalry, and when they mount guard in the palaces, their
+arm is a carabine. A party of them always appear near the carriage of
+the king, or indeed near that of any of the reigning branch of the
+family. There are said to be four regiments or companies of them, of
+four hundred men each; but it strikes me the number must be exaggerated.
+I should think, however, that there are fully a thousand of them. In
+addition to these selected troops, there are three hundred Swiss, of the
+Swiss and royal guards; of the latter, including all arms, there must be
+many thousands. These are the troops that usually mount guard in and
+about all the palaces. The annual budget of France appears in the
+estimates at about a _milliard_, or a thousand millions of francs; but
+the usual mystifications are resorted to, and the truth will give the
+annual central expenses of the country at not less, I think, than two
+hundred millions of dollars. This sum, however, covers many items of
+expenditure, that we are accustomed to consider purely local. The
+clergy, for instance, are paid out of it, as is a portion of the cost of
+maintaining the roads. On the other hand, much money is collected, as a
+general regulation, that does not appear in the budget. Few or no
+churches are built, and there are charges for masses, interments,
+christenings, and fees for a hundred things, of which no account is
+taken in making out the sum total of the cost of government.
+
+It was the policy of Napoleon to create a system of centralization, that
+should cause everything to emanate from himself. The whole organization
+of government had this end in view, and all the details of the
+departments have been framed expressly to further this object. The
+prefects are no more than so many political _aides_, whose duty it is to
+carry into effect the orders that emanate from the great head, and lines
+of telegraphs are established all over France, in such a way that a
+communication may be sent from the Tuileries, to the remotest corner of
+the kingdom, in the course of a few hours. It has been said that one of
+the first steps towards effecting a revolution, ought to be to seize the
+telegraphs at Paris, by means of which such information and orders could
+be sent into the provinces, as the emergency might seem to require.
+
+This system of centralization has almost neutralized the advancement of
+the nation, in a knowledge of the usages and objects of the political
+liberty that the French have obtained, by bitter experience, from other
+sources. It is the constant aim of that portion of the community which
+understands the action of free institutions, to increase the powers of
+the municipalities, and to lessen the functions of the central
+government; but their efforts are resisted with a jealous distrust of
+everything like popular dictation. Their municipal privileges are,
+rightly enough, thought to be the entering wedges of real liberty. The
+people ought to manage their own affairs, just as far as they can do so
+without sacrificing their interests for want of a proper care, and here
+is the starting point of representation. So far from France enjoying
+such a system, however, half the time a bell cannot be hung in a parish
+church, or a bridge repaired, without communications with and orders
+from Paris.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER VI.
+
+Letters of Introduction.--European Etiquette.--Diplomatic Entertainments.
+--Ladies in Coffee-houses.--French Hospitality.--Mr. Canning at Paris.
+--Parisian Hotels.--French Lady at Washington.--Receptions in Paris
+and in New York.--Mode of Announcement.--Republican Affectation.
+--Hotel Monaco.--Dinner given to Mr. Canning.--Diplomatic Etiquette.
+--European Ambassadors.--Prime Minister of France.--Mr. Canning.
+--Count Pozzo di Borgo.--Precedency at Dinner.--American Etiquette.
+--A French Dinner.--Servants.--Catholic Fasting.--Conversation with
+Canning.--English Prejudice against Americans.
+
+
+To MRS. POMEROY, COOPERSTOWN, NEW YORK.
+
+I quitted America with some twenty letters of introduction, that had
+been pressed upon me by different friends, but which were carefully
+locked up in a secretary, where they still remain, and are likely to
+remain for ever, or until they are destroyed. As this may appear a
+singular resolution for one who left his own country to be absent for
+years, I shall endeavour to explain it. In the first place, I have a
+strong repugnance to pushing myself on the acquaintance of any man: this
+feeling may, in fact, proceed from pride, but I have a disposition to
+believe that it proceeds, in part, also from a better motive. These
+letters of introduction, like verbal introductions, are so much abused
+in America, that the latter feeling, perhaps I might say both feelings,
+are increased by the fact. Of all the people in the world we are the
+most prodigal of these favours, when self-respect and propriety would
+teach us we ought to be among the most reserved, simply because the
+character of the nation is so low, that the European, more than half the
+time, fancies he is condescending when he bestows attentions on our
+people at all. Other travellers may give you a different account of the
+matter, but let every one be responsible for his own opinions and facts.
+Then a friend who, just as we left home, returned from Europe after an
+absence of five years, assured me that he found his letters of but
+little use; that nearly every agreeable acquaintance he made was the
+result of accident, and that the Europeans in general were much more
+cautious in giving and receiving letters of this nature than ourselves.
+
+The usages of all Europe, those of the English excepted, differ from our
+own on the subject of visits. There the stranger, or the latest arrival,
+is expected to make the first visit, and an inquiry for your address is
+always taken for an intimation that your acquaintance would be
+acceptable. Many, perhaps most Americans, lose a great deal through
+their provincial breeding, in this respect, in waiting for attentions
+that it is their duty to invite, by putting themselves in the way of
+receiving them. The European usage is not only the most rational, but it
+is the most delicate. It is the most rational, as there is a manifest
+absurdity in supposing, for instance, that the inhabitant of a town is
+to know whenever a visitor from the country arrives; and it is the most
+delicate, as it leaves the newcomer, who is supposed to know his own
+wishes best, to decide for himself whether he wishes to make
+acquaintances or not. In short, our own practices are provincial and
+rustic, and cannot exist when the society of the country shall have
+taken the usual phases of an advanced civilization. Even in England, in
+the higher classes, the cases of distinguished men excepted, it is usual
+for the stranger to seek the introduction.
+
+Under such circumstances, coupled with the utter insignificance of an
+ordinary individual in a town like Paris, you will easily understand
+that we had the first months of our residence entirely to ourselves. As
+a matter of course, we called on our own minister and his wife; and, as
+a matter of course, we have been included in the dinners and parties
+that they are accustomed to give at this season of the year. This,
+however, has merely brought us in contact with a chance-medley of our
+own countrymen, these diplomatic entertainments being quite obviously a
+matter of accident, so far as the set is concerned. The dinners of your
+banker, however, are still worse, since with them the visiting-list is
+usually a mere extract from the ledger.
+
+Our privacy has not been without its advantages. It has enabled us to
+visit all the visible objects without the incumbrance of engagements, and
+given me leisure to note and to comment on things that might otherwise
+have been overlooked. For several months we have had nothing to do but to
+see sights, get familiarized with a situation that, at first, we found
+singularly novel, and to brush up our French.
+
+I never had sufficient faith in the popular accounts of the usages of
+other countries, to believe one-half of what I have heard. I distrusted
+from the first the fact of ladies--I mean real, _bona fide_ ladies, women
+of sentiment, delicacy, taste, and condition--frequenting public
+eating-houses, and habitually living, without the retirement and reserve
+that is so necessary to all _women_, not to say _men_, of the _caste_. I
+found it difficult, therefore, to imagine I should meet with many females
+of condition in _restaurans_ and _cafes_. Such a thing might happen on an
+emergency, but it was assailing too much all those feelings and tastes
+which become inherent in refinement, to suppose that the tables of even
+the best house of the sort in Paris could be honoured by the presence of
+such persons, except under particular circumstances. My own observation
+corroborated this opinion, and, in order to make sure of the fact, I have
+put the question to nearly every Frenchwoman of rank it has since been my
+good fortune to become sufficiently acquainted with to take the liberty.
+The answer has been uniform. Such things are sometimes done, but rarely;
+and even then it is usual to have the service in a private room. One old
+lady, a woman perfectly competent to decide on such a point, told me
+frankly:--"We never do it, except by way of a frolic, or when in a humour
+which induces people to do many other silly and unbecoming things. Why
+should we go to the _restaurateurs_ to eat? We have our own houses and
+servants as well as the English, or even you Americans"--it may be
+supposed I laughed--"and certainly the French are not so devoid of good
+taste as not to understand that the mixed society of a public-house is
+not the best possible company for a woman."
+
+It is, moreover, a great mistake to imagine that the French are not
+hospitable, and that they do not entertain as freely, and as often, as
+any other people. The only difference between them and the English, in
+this respect, or between them and ourselves, is in the better taste and
+ease which regulate their intercourse of this nature. While there is a
+great deal of true elegance, there is no fuss, at a French
+entertainment; and all that you have heard of the superiority of the
+kitchen in this country, is certainly true. Society is divided into
+_castes_ in Paris, as it is everywhere else; and the degrees of elegance
+and refinement increase as one ascends as a matter of course; but there
+is less of effort, in every class, than is usual with us. One of the
+best-bred Englishmen of my acquaintance, and one, too, who had long been
+in the world, has frankly admitted to me, that the highest tone of
+English society is merely an imitation of that which existed in Paris
+previously to the revolution, and of which, though modified as to usages
+and forms, a good deal still remains. By the highest tone, however, you
+are not to suppose I mean that laboured, frigid, heartless manner that
+so many, in England especially, mistake for high breeding, merely
+because they do not know how to unite with the finish which constant
+intercourse with the world creates, the graceful semblance of living
+less for one's self than for others, and to express, as it were, their
+feelings and wishes, rather than to permit one's own to escape him--a
+habit that, like the reflection of a mirror, produces the truest and
+most pleasing images, when thrown back from surfaces the most highly
+polished. But I am anticipating rather than giving you a history of what
+I have seen.
+
+In consequence of our not having brought any letters, as has just been
+mentioned, and of not having sought society, no one gave themselves any
+trouble on our account for the first three or four months of our
+residence in Paris. At the end of that period, however, I made my
+_debut_ at, probably, as brilliant an entertainment as one usually sees
+here in the course of a whole winter. Mr. Canning, then Secretary of
+State for Foreign Affairs, came to Paris on a visit, and, as is usual on
+such occasions, diplomacy was a good deal mixed up with eating and
+drinking. Report says, that the etiquette of the court was a good deal
+deranged by this visit, the Bourbons not having adopted the hale-fellow
+hospitality of the English kings. M. de Villele or M. de Damas would be
+invited to dine at Windsor almost as a matter of course; but the
+descendant of Hugh Capet hesitated about breaking bread with an English
+commoner. The matter is understood to have been gotten over, by giving
+the entertainment at St. Cloud, where, it would seem, the royal person
+has fewer immunities than at the Tuileries. But, among other attentions
+that were bestowed on the English statesman, Mr. Brown determined to
+give him a great diplomatic dinner; and our own legations having a great
+poverty of subordinates, except in the way of travelling _attaches_, I
+was invited to occupy one end of the table, while the regular secretary
+took his seat at the other. Before I attempt a short description of this
+entertainment, it may help to enliven the solitude of your mountain
+residence, and serve to give you more distinct ideas of the matter than
+can be obtained from novels, if I commence with a summary of the
+appliances and modes of polite intercourse in this part of the world, as
+they are to be distinguished from our own.
+
+In the first place, you are to discard from your mind all images of two
+rooms and folding-doors, with a passage six feet wide, a narrow carpeted
+flight of steps, and a bed-room prepared for the ladies to uncloak in,
+and another in which the men can brush their hair and hide their hats.
+Some such snuggeries very possibly exist in England, among the middling
+classes; but I believe all over the continent of Europe style is never
+attempted without more suitable means to carry out the intention.
+
+In Paris, every one who mingles with the world lives in an hotel, or a
+house that has a court and an outer gate. Usually the building surrounds
+three sides of this court, and sometimes the whole four; though small
+hotels are to be found, in which the court is encircled on two, or even
+on three of its sides, merely by high walls. The gate is always in the
+keeping of a regular porter, who is an important personage about the
+establishment, taking in letters, tickets, etc., ejecting blackguards
+and all other suspicious persons, carrying messages, besides levying
+contributions on all the inmates of the house, in the way of wood and
+coal. In short, he is in some measure, held to be responsible for the
+exits and entrances, being a sort of domestic gendarme. In the larger
+hotels there are two courts, the great and _la basse cour_, the latter
+being connected with the offices and stables.
+
+Of course, these hotels vary in size and magnificence. Some are not
+larger than our own largest town dwellings, while others, again, are
+palaces. As these buildings were originally constructed to lodge a
+single establishment, they have their principal and their inferior
+apartments; some have their summer and their winter apartments. As is,
+and always must be the case, where everything like state and
+magnificence are affected, the reception-rooms are en suite; the mode of
+building which prevails in America, being derived from the secondary
+class of English houses. It is true, that in London, many men of rank,
+perhaps of the nobility, do not live in houses any larger, or much
+better, than the best of our own; though I think, that one oftener sees
+rooms of a good size and proper elevation, even in these dwellings, than
+it is usual to see in America. But the great houses of London, such as
+Burlington-house, Northumberland-house, Devonshire-house,
+Lansdown-house, Sutherland-house (the most magnificent of all) etc. are,
+more or less, on the continental plan, though not generally built around
+courts. This plan eschews passages of all descriptions, except among the
+private parts of the dwelling. In this respect, an American house is the
+very opposite of a European house. We are nothing without passages, it
+being indispensable that every room should open on one; whereas, here
+the great point is to have as little to do with them as possible. Thus
+you quit the great staircase by a principal door, and find yourself in
+an ante-chamber; this communicates with one or two more rooms of the
+same character, gradually improving in ornaments and fixtures, until you
+enter a _salon_. Then comes a succession of apartments, of greater or
+less magnificence, according to circumstances until you are led entirely
+round the edifice, quitting it by a door on the great staircase again,
+opposite to the one by which you entered. In those cases in which there
+are courts, the principal rooms are ranged in this manner, _en suite_,
+on the exterior range, usually looking out on the gardens, while those
+within them, which look into the court, contain the bed-rooms, boudoir,
+eating-rooms, and perhaps the library. So tenacious are those, who lay
+any claim to gentility here, of the use of the ante-chambers, that I
+scarcely recollect a lodging of any sort, beyond the solitary chamber of
+some student, without, at least, one. They seem indispensable, and I
+think rightly, to all ideas of style, or even of comfort. I remember to
+have seen an amusing instance of the strength of this feeling in the
+case of the wife of a former French minister, at Washington. The
+building she inhabited was one of the ordinary American double houses,
+as they are called, with a passage through the centre, the stairs in the
+passage, and a short corridor, to communicate with the bed-rooms above.
+Off the end of this upper corridor, if, indeed, so short a transverse
+passage deserves the name, was partitioned a room of some eight feet by
+ten, as a bed-room. A room adjoining this, was converted into a boudoir
+and bed-room, for Madame de ----, by means of a silk screen. The usual
+door of the latter opened, of course, on the passage. In a morning call
+one day, I was received in the boudoir. Surprised to be carried up
+stairs on such an occasion, I was still more so to find myself taken
+through a small room, before I was admitted to the larger. The amount of
+it all was; that Madame de ----, accustomed to have many rooms, and to
+think it vulgar to receive in her great drawing-room of a morning,
+believing _au premier_, or up one pair of stairs, more genteel than the
+_rez de chaussee_, or the ground floor, and feeling the necessity of an
+ante-chamber as there was an abruptness in being at once admitted into
+the presence of a lady from a staircase, a sort of local _brusquerie_,
+that would suit her cook better than the wife of an envoy extraordinary,
+had contrived to introduce her guests through the little bed-room, at
+the end of the upstairs entry!
+
+From all this you will be prepared to understand some of the essential
+differences between a reception in Paris and one at New York, or even at
+Washington. The footman, or footmen, if there are two, ascend to the
+inner ante-chamber, with their masters and mistresses, where they
+receive the cloaks, shawls, over-coats, or whatever else has been used
+for the sake of mere warmth, and withdraw. If they are sent home, as is
+usually the case at dinners and evening parties, they return with the
+things at the hour ordered; but if the call be merely a passing one, or
+the guest means to go early to some other house, they either wait in the
+ante-chamber, or in a room provided for that purpose. The French are
+kind to their servants; much kinder than either the English, or their
+humble imitators, ourselves; and it is quite common to see, not only a
+good warm room, but refreshments, provided for the servants at a French
+party. In England, they either crowd the narrow passages and the
+door-way, or throng the street, as with us. In both countries, the poor
+coachmen sit for hours on their carriage-boxes, like so many ducks, in
+the drizzle and rain.
+
+The footman gives the names of his party to the _maitre d'hotel_, or the
+groom of the chambers, who, as he throws open the door of the first
+drawing-room, announces them in a loud voice. Announcing by means of a
+line of servants, is rarely, if ever, practised in France, though it is
+still done in England, at large parties, and in the great houses. Every
+one has heard the story of the attempt at Philadelphia, some forty years
+ago, to introduce the latter custom, when, by the awkwardness of a
+servant, a party was announced as "Master and Mistress, and the young
+ladies;" but you will smile when I tell you that the latter part of this
+style is precisely that which is most in vogue at Paris. A young lady
+here may be admired, she may be danced with, and she may even look and
+be looked at; but in society she talks little, is never loud or
+_belleish_, is always neat and simple in her attire, using very little
+jewelry, and has scarcely any other name than Mademoiselle. The usual
+mode of announcing is, "Monsieur le Comte et Madame la Comtesse d'une
+telle, avec leurs demoiselles;" or, in plain English, "The Count and
+Countess Such-a-one, with their daughters" This you will perceive is not
+so far, after all, from "Master and Mistress, and the young ladies." The
+English, more simple in some respects, and less so in others, usually
+give every name, though, in the use of titles, the utmost good taste is
+observed. Thus every nobleman below a duke is almost uniformly addressed
+and styled Lord A----, Lord B----, etc. and their wives, Ladies A----,
+and B----. Thus the Marquess of Lansdowne would, I think, always be
+addressed and spoken of, and even announced, merely as Lord Lansdowne.
+This, you will observe, is using the simplest possible style, and it
+appears to me that there is rather an affectation of simplicity in their
+ordinary intercourse, the term "My Lord" being hardly ever used, except
+by the tradesmen and domestics. The safest rule for an American, and
+certainly the one that good taste would dictate, is to be very sparing
+in his use of everything of this sort, since he cannot be always certain
+of the proper usages of the different countries he visits, and, so long
+as he avoids unnecessary affectations of republicanisms, and, if a
+gentleman, this he will do without any effort, simplicity is his cue.
+When I say _avoids the affectations of republicanisms_, I do not mean
+the points connected with principles, but those vulgar and underbred
+pretensions of ultra equality and liberalism, which, while they mark
+neither manliness nor a real appreciation of equal rights almost
+uniformly betray a want of proper training and great ignorance of the
+world. Whenever, however, any attempt is made to identify equality of
+rights and democratical institutions with vulgarity and truculency, as
+is sometimes attempted here, in the presence of Americans, and even in
+good company, it is the part of every gentleman of our country to
+improve the opportunity that is thus afforded him, to show it is a
+source of pride with him to belong to a nation in which a hundred men
+are not depressed politically, in order that one may be great; and also
+to show how much advantage, after all, he who is right in substance has
+over him who is substantially wrong, even in the forms of society, and
+in that true politeness which depends on natural justice. Such a
+principle, acted on systematically would soon place the gentlemen of
+America where they ought to be, and the gentlemen of other countries
+where, sooner or later, they must be content to descend, or to change
+their systems. That these things are not so, must be ascribed to our
+provincial habits, our remote situation, comparative insignificance, and
+chiefly to the circumstance that men's minds, trained under a different
+state of things, cannot keep even pace with the wonderful progress of
+the facts of the country.
+
+But all this time I have only got you into the outer _salon_ of a French
+hotel. In order that we may proceed more regularly, we will return to
+the dinner given by our minister to Mr. Canning. Mr. Brown has an
+apartment in the Hotel Monaco, one of the best houses in Paris. The
+Prince of Monaco is the sovereign of a little territory of the same
+name, on the Gulf of Nice, at the foot of the maritime Alps. His states
+may be some six or eight miles square, and the population some six or
+eight thousand. The ancient name of the family is Grimaldi; but by some
+intermarriage or other, the Duke of Valentinois, a Frenchman, has become
+the prince. This little state is still independent, though under the
+especial protection of the King of Sardinia, and without foreign
+relations. It was formerly a common thing for the petty princes of
+Europe to own hotels at Paris. Thus the present Hotel of the Legion of
+Honour was built by a Prince of Salms; and the Princes of Monaco had
+two, one of which is occupied by the Austrian ambassador, and, in the
+other, our own minister, just at this moment, has an apartment. As I had
+been pressed especially to be early, I went a little before six, and
+finding no one in the drawing-room, I strolled into the bureau, where I
+found Mr. Shelden, the secretary of legation, who lived in the family,
+dressed for dinner. We chatted a little, and, on my admiring the
+magnificence of the rooms, he gave me the history of the hotel, as you
+have just heard it, with an additional anecdote, that may be worth
+relating.
+
+"This hotel," said the secretary, "was once owned by M. de Talleyrand,
+and this bureau was probably the receptacle of state secrets of far
+greater importance than any that are connected with our own simple and
+unsupported claims for justice." He then went on to say, that the
+citizens of Hamburg, understanding it was the intention of Napoleon to
+incorporate their town with the empire, had recourse to a _...ceur_,[5]
+in order to prevent an act that, by destroying their neutrality, would
+annihilate their commerce. Four millions of francs were administered on
+this occasion, and of these, a large proportion, it is said, went to pay
+for the Hotel Monaco, which was a recent purchase of M. de Talleyrand.
+To the horror of the Hambourgeois, the money was scarcely paid, when the
+deprecated decree appeared, and every man of them was converted into a
+Frenchman by the stroke of a pen. The worthy burghers were accustomed to
+receive a _quid pro quo_ for every florin they bestowed, failing of
+which, on the present occasion, they sent a deputation forthwith, to
+Napoleon, to reveal the facts, and to make their complaints. That great
+man little liked that any one but himself should peculate in his
+dominions, and, in the end, M. de Talleyrand was obliged to quit the
+Hotel Monaco. By some means with which I am unacquainted, most probably
+by purchase, however, the house is now the property of Madame Adelaide
+of Orleans.
+
+[Footnote 5: the first three letters of the word cannot be correctly
+read on the original book]
+
+The rolling of a coach into the court was a signal for us to be at our
+posts, and we abandoned the bureau so lately occupied by the great
+father of diplomacy, for the drawing-room. I have already told you that
+this dinner was in honour of Mr. Canning, and, although diplomatic in
+one sense, it was not so strictly confined to the corps as to prevent a
+selection. This selection, in honour of the principal guest, had been
+made from the representatives of the great powers, Spain being the least
+important nation represented on the occasion, the republic of
+Switzerland excepted. I do not know whether the presence of the Swiss
+charge-d'affaires was so intended or not, but it struck me as pointed
+and in good taste, for all the other foreign agents were ambassadors,
+with the exception of the Prussian, who was an Envoy Extraordinary.
+Diplomacy has its honorary gradations as well as a military corps; and,
+as you can know but little of such matters, I will explain them _en
+passant_. First in rank comes the Ambassador. This functionary is
+supposed to represent the personal dignity of the state that sends him.
+If a king, there is a room in his house that has a throne, and it is
+usual to see the chair reversed, in respect for its sanctity; and it
+appears to be etiquette to suspend the portrait of the sovereign beneath
+the canopy. The Envoy Extraordinary comes next, and then the Minister
+Plenipotentiary. Ordinarily, these two functions are united in the same
+individual. Such is the rank of Mr. Brown. The Minister Resident is a
+lower grade, and the Charge-d'affaires the lowest of all. _Inter se_,
+these personages take rank according to this scale. Previously to the
+peace of 1814, the representative of one monarch laid claim to precede
+the representative of another, always admitting, however, of the
+validity of the foregoing rule. This pretension gave rise to a good deal
+of heartburning and contention. Nothing can, in itself, be of greater
+indifference whether A. or B. walk into the reception-room or to the
+dinner-table first; but when the idea of general superiority is
+associated with the act, the aspect of the thing is entirely changed.
+Under the old system, the ambassador of the Emperor, claimed precedence
+over all other ambassadors, and, I believe, the representatives of the
+kings of France had high pretensions also. Now there are great mutations
+in states. Spain, once the most important kingdom of Europe, has much
+less influence to-day than Prussia, a power of yesterday. Then the
+minister of the most insignificant prince claimed precedency over the
+representative of the most potent republic. This might have passed while
+republics were insignificant and dependent; but no one can believe that
+a minister of America, for instance, representing a state of fifty
+millions, as will be the case before long, would submit to such an
+extravagant pretension on the part of a minister of Wurtemburg, or
+Sardinia, or Portugal. He would not submit to such a pretension on the
+part of the minister of any power on earth.
+
+I do not believe that the Congress of Vienna had sufficient foresight,
+or sufficient knowledge of the actual condition of the United States, to
+foresee this difficulty; but there were embarrassing points to be
+settled among the European states themselves, and the whole affair was
+disposed of on a very discreet and equitable principle. It was decided
+that priority of standing at a particular court should regulate the rank
+between the different classes of agents at that particular court. Thus
+the ambassador longest at Paris precedes all the other ambassadors at
+Paris; and the same rule prevails with the ministers and charges,
+according to their respective gradations of rank. A provision, however,
+was made in favour of the representative of the Pope, who, if of the
+rank of a nuncio, precedes all ambassadors. The concession has been made
+in honour of the church, which, as you must know, or ought to be told,
+is an interest much protected in all monarchies, statesmen being
+notoriously of tender consciences.
+
+The constant habit of meeting drills the diplomatic corps so well, that
+they go through the evolutions of etiquette as dexterously as a corps of
+regular troops perform their wheelings and countermarches. The first
+great point with them is punctuality; for, to people who sacrifice so
+much of it to forms, time gets to be precious. The roll of wheels was
+incessant in the court of the Hotel Monaco, from the time the first
+carriage entered until the last had set down its company. I know, as
+every man who reflects must know, that it is inherently ill-bred to be
+late anywhere; but I never before felt how completely it was high
+breeding to be as punctual as possible. The _maitre d'hotel_ had as much
+as he could do to announce the company, who entered as closely after
+each other as decorum and dignity would permit. I presume one party
+waited a little for the others in the outer drawing-room, the reception
+being altogether in the inner room.
+
+The Americans very properly came first. We were Mr. Gallatin, who was
+absent from London on leave, his wife and daughter, and a clergyman and
+his wife, and myself; Mrs. ---- having declined the invitation on account
+of ill health. The announcing and the entrance of most of the company,
+especially as everybody was in high dinner-dress, the women in jewels
+and the men wearing all their orders, had something of the air of a
+scenic display. The effect was heightened by the magnificence of the
+hotel, the drawing-room in which we were collected being almost regal.
+
+The first person who appeared was a handsome, compact, well-built,
+gentleman-like little man, who was announced as the Duke of Villa
+Hermosa, the Spanish ambassador. He was dressed with great simplicity
+and beauty, having, however, the breast of his coat covered with stars,
+among which I recognized, with historical reverence, that of the Golden
+Fleece. He came alone, his wife pleading indisposition for her absence.
+The Prussian minister and his wife came next. Then followed Lord and
+Lady Granville, the representatives of England. He was a large,
+well-looking man, but wanted the perfect command of movement and manner
+that so much distinguish his brethren in diplomacy: as for mere physical
+stuff, he and our own minister, who stands six feet four in his
+stockings, would make material enough for all the rest of the corps. He
+wore the star of the Bath. The Austrian ambassador and ambassadress
+followed, a couple of singularly high air, and a good tone of manner. He
+is a Hungarian, and very handsome; she a Veronese, I believe, and
+certainly a woman admirably adapted for her station. They had hardly
+made their salutations before M. le Comte et Mad. la Comtesse de Villele
+were announced. Here, then, we had the French prime minister. As the
+women precede the men into a drawing-room here, knowing how to walk and
+to curtsey alone, I did not, at first, perceive the great man, who
+followed so close to his wife's skirts as to be nearly hid. But he was
+soon flying about the room at large, and betrayed himself immediately to
+be a fidget. Instead of remaining stationary, or nearly so as became his
+high quality, he took the initiative in compliments, and had nearly
+every diplomatic man walking apart in the adjoining room, in a political
+aside, in less than twenty minutes. He had a countenance of shrewdness,
+and I make little doubt is a better man in a bureau than in a
+drawing-room. His colleague, the foreign minister, M. de Damas, and his
+wife, came next. He was a large, heavy-looking personage, that I suspect
+throws no small part of the diplomacy on the shoulders of the premier;
+though he had more the manner of good society than his colleague. He has
+already exchanged his office for that of governor of the heir
+presumptive, as I have already stated. There was a pause, when a quiet,
+even-paced, classical-looking man, in the attire of an ecclesiastic,
+appeared in the door, and was announced as "My Lord the Nuncio." He was
+then an archbishop, and wore the usual dress of his rank; but I have
+since met him at an evening party with a red hat; under his arm, the
+Pope having recalled him, and raised him to that dignity. He is now
+Cardinal Macchi. He was a priestly and an intellectual-looking
+personage, and, externals considered, well suited to his station. He
+wore a decoration or two, as well as most of the others.
+
+"My Lord Clanricarde and Mr. Canning" came next, and the great man,
+followed by his son-in-law, made his appearance. He walked into the room
+with the quiet _aplomb_ of a man accustomed to being _lionised_; and
+certainly, without being of striking, he was of very pleasing
+appearance. His size was ordinary, but his frame was compact and well
+built, neither too heavy nor too light for his years, but of just the
+proportions to give one the idea of a perfect management of the machine.
+His face was agreeable, and his eye steady and searching. He and M. de
+Villele were the very opposites in demeanour, though, after all, it was
+easy to see that the Englishman had the most latent force about him. One
+was fidgety, and the other humorous; for, with all his command of limb
+and gesture, nothing could be more natural than the expression of Mr.
+Canning, I may have imagined that I detected some of his wit, from a
+knowledge of the character of his mind. He left the impression, however,
+of a man whose natural powers were checked by a trained and factitious
+deference to the rank of those with whom he associated. Lord Granville,
+I thought, treated him with a sort of affectionate deference; and, right
+or wrong, I jumped to the conclusion, that the English ambassador was a
+straight-forward, good fellow at the bottom, and one very likely to
+badger the fidgetty premier, by his steady determination to do what was
+right. I thought M. de Damas, too, looked like an honest man. God
+forgive me, if I do injustice to any of these gentlemen!
+
+All this time, I have forgotten Count Pozzo di Borgo, the Russian
+ambassador. Being a bachelor, he came alone. It might have been fancy,
+but I thought he appeared more at his ease under the American roof than
+any of his colleagues. The perfect good understanding between our own
+government and that of Russia extends to their representatives, and,
+policy or not, we are better treated by them than by any other foreign
+ministers. This fact should be known and appreciated, for as one citizen
+of the republic, however insignificant, I have no notion of being
+blackguarded and vituperated half a century, and then cajoled into
+forgetfulness, at the suggestions of fear and expediency, as
+circumstances render our good-will of importance. Let us at least show
+that we are not mannikins to be pulled about for the convenience and
+humours of others, but that we know what honest words are, understand
+the difference between civility and abuse, and have pride enough to
+resent contumely, when, at least, we feel it to be unmerited. M. Pozzo
+is a handsome man, of good size and a fine dark eye, and has a greater
+reputation for talents than any other member of the diplomatic corps now
+at Paris. He is by birth a Corsican, and, I have heard it said,
+distantly related to Bonaparte. This may be true, Corsica being so small
+a country; just as some of us are related to everybody in West Jersey.
+Our party now consisted of the prime minister, the secretary of foreign
+affairs, the Austrian and English ambassadors, and the Prussian
+minister, with their wives,--the Nuncio, the Russian and Spanish
+ambassadors, the Swiss charge-d'affaires, Mr. Canning, Lord Clanricarde,
+--Mr. Mrs. and Miss Gallatin, and the other Americans already mentioned,
+or twenty-five in all.
+
+If I had been struck with the rapid and business-like manner in which
+the company entered, I was amused with the readiness with which they
+paired off when dinner was announced. It was like a _coup de theatre_,
+every man and woman knowing his or her exact rank and precedency, and
+the time when to move. This business of getting out of a drawing-room to
+a dinner-table is often one of difficulty, though less frequently in
+France than in most other European countries, on account of the
+admirable tact of the women, who seldom suffer a knotty point to get the
+ascendancy, but, by choosing the gentlemen for themselves, settle the
+affair off hand. From their decision, of course, there is no appeal. In
+order that in your simplicity you may not mistake the importance of this
+moment, I will relate an anecdote of what lately occurred at a dinner
+given by an English functionary in Holland.
+
+When William invaded England, in 1688, he took with him many Dutch
+nobles, some of whom remained, and became English peers. Among others,
+he created one of his followers an Irish earl; but choosing to return to
+Holland, this person was afterwards known as the Count de ----, although
+his Irish rank was always acknowledged. It happened that the wife of the
+descendant of this person was present at the entertainment in question.
+When dinner was announced, the company remarked that the master of the
+house was in a dilemma. There was much consultation, and a delay of near
+half an hour before the matter was decided. The debated point was,
+whether Madame de ---- was to be considered as a Dutch or an Irish
+countess. If the latter, there were English ladies present who were
+entitled to precede her; if the former, as a stranger, she might get
+that advantage herself. Luckily for the rights of hospitality, the Dutch
+lady got the best of it.
+
+These things sound absurd, and sometimes they are so; but this social
+drilling, unless carried to extremes, is not without its use. In
+America, I have always understood that, on such occasions, silent laws
+of etiquette exist in all good company, which are founded on propriety
+and tact. The young give way to the old, the undistinguished to the
+distinguished, and he who is at home to the stranger. These rules are
+certainly the most rational, and in the best taste, when they can be
+observed, and, on the whole, they lead perhaps to the fewest
+embarrassments; always so, if there happen to be none but the well-bred
+present, since seats become of little consideration where no importance
+is attached to them. I confess to some manoeuvring in my time, to get
+near, or away from a fire, out of a draught, or next some agreeable
+woman; but the idea whether I was at the head or the foot of the table
+never crossed my mind: and yet here, where they do mean the salt to come
+into the account, I begin to take care that they do not "bite their
+thumbs" at me. Two or three little things have occurred in my presence,
+which show that all our people do not even understand the ways of their
+own good society. A very young man lately, under the impression that
+gallantry required it, led one of the most distinguished women in the
+room to the table, merely because he happened to be next her, at the
+moment dinner was announced. This was certainly a failure even in
+American etiquette, every woman being more disposed to appreciate the
+delicacy and respect which should have induced such a person to give
+place to one of higher claims, than to prize the head-over-heels
+assiduity that caused the boy to forget himself. Sentiment should be the
+guide on such occasions, and no man is a gentleman until his habits are
+brought completely in subjection to its dictates, in all matters of this
+sort.
+
+There was very little sentiment, however, in marshalling the company at
+the dinner given to Mr. Canning. I will not undertake to say that all
+the guests were invited to meet this gentleman, and that he had been
+asked to name a day, as is usual when it is intended to pay an especial
+compliment; but I was asked to meet him, and I understood that the
+dinner was in his honour. Diplomatic etiquette made short work of the
+matter, notwithstanding, for the doors were hardly thrown open, before
+all the privileged vanished, with a quickness that was surprising. The
+minister took Madame de Villele; M. de Villele, Mrs. Brown; M. de Damas,
+the wife of the oldest ambassador; and the Nuncio, Madame de Damas:
+after which, the ambassadors and ministers took each other's wives in
+due order, and with a promptitude that denoted great practice. Even the
+charge disappeared, leaving the rest of us to settle matters among
+ourselves as well as we could. Mr. Canning, Mr. Gallatin, Lord
+Clanricarde, the divine, the secretary, and myself, were left with only
+the wife of the clergyman and Miss Gallatin. As a matter of course, the
+Americans, feeling themselves at home, made signs for the two Englishmen
+to precede them, and Mr. Canning offered his arm to Mrs. ----, and Lord
+Clanricarde, his to Miss Gallatin. Here occurred a touch of character
+that is worthy to be mentioned, as showing of how very little account an
+American, male or female, is in the estimation of a European, and how
+very arbitrary are the laws of etiquette among our English cousins. Mr.
+Canning actually gave way to his son-in-law, leaving the oldest of the
+two ladies to come after the youngest, because, as a marquis, his
+son-in-law took precedence of a commoner! This was out of place in
+America, at least, where the parties were, by a fiction in law, if not
+in politeness, and it greatly scandalized all our Yankee notions of
+propriety. Mrs. ---- afterwards told me that he apologized for the
+circumstance, giving Lord Clanricarde's rank as the reason.
+"_Sempereadem_," or "worse and worse," as my old friend O----n used to
+translate it. What became of the precedency of the married lady all this
+time? you will be ready to ask. Alas! she was an American, and had no
+precedency. The twelve millions may not settle this matter as it should
+be; but, take my word for it, the "fifty millions" will. Insignificant as
+all this is, or rather ought to be, your grandchildren and mine will
+live to see the mistake rectified. How much better would it be for those
+who cannot stop the progress of events, by vain wishes and idle regrets,
+to concede the point gracefully, and on just principles, than to have
+their cherished prejudices broken down by dint of sheer numbers and
+power!
+
+The dinner itself was, like every dinner that is given at Paris,
+beautiful in decoration, admirable in its order, and excellent in
+viands, or rather, in its dishes; for it is the cookery and not the
+staple articles that form the boast of the French kitchen. As you are
+notable in your own region for understanding these matters, I must say a
+word touching the gastric science as it is understood here. A general
+error exists in America on the subject of French cookery, which is not
+highly seasoned, but whose merit consists in blending flavours and in
+arranging compounds, in such a manner as to produce, at the same time,
+the lightest and most agreeable food. A lady who, from her public
+situation, receives once a week, for the entire year, and whose table
+has a reputation, assured me lately, that all the spices consumed
+annually in her kitchen did not cost her a franc. The _effect_ of a
+French dinner is its principal charm. One of reasonably moderate habits,
+rises from the table with a sense of enjoyment, that, to a stranger, at
+least, is sometimes startling. I have, on several occasions, been afraid
+I was relaxing into the vices of a _gourmet_, if, indeed, vices they can
+be called. The _gourmand_ is a beast, and there is nothing to be said in
+his favour; but, after all, I incline to the opinion that no one is the
+worse for a knowledge of what is agreeable to the palate. Perhaps no one
+of either sex is thoroughly trained, or properly bred, without being
+_tant soit peu de gourmet_. The difference between sheer eating, and
+eating with tact and intelligence, is so apparent as to need no
+explanation. A dinner here does not oppress one. The wine neither
+intoxicates nor heats, and the frame of mind and body in which one is
+left, is precisely that best suited to intellectual and social
+pleasures. I make no doubt, that one of the chief causes of the French
+being so agreeable as companions, is, in a considerable degree, owing to
+the admirable qualities of their table. A national character may emanate
+from a kitchen. Roast beef, bacon, pudding, and beer, and port, will
+make a different man, in time, from Chateau Margau, _cotelettes_,
+_consommes_, and _souffles_. The very name of _vol au vent_ is enough to
+make one walk on air!
+
+Seriously, these things have more influence than may be, at a glance,
+imagined. The first great change I could wish to make in America, would
+be to see a juster appreciation of the substance, and less importance
+attached to outward forms, in moral things. The second would be, to
+create a standard of greatness and distinction that should be
+independent, or nearly independent, of money. The next, a more reasoning
+and original tone of thought as respects our own distinctive principles
+and _distinctive situation_, with a total indifference to the theories
+that have been broached to sustain an alien and an antagonist system, in
+England; and the last (the climax), a total reform in the kitchen! If I
+were to reverse the order of these improvements, I am not certain the
+three last might not follow as a consequence of the first. After our
+people have been taught to cook a dinner, they ought also to be taught
+how to eat it.
+
+Our entertainment lasted the usual hour and a half; and, as one is all
+this time eating, and there are limits to the capacity of a stomach, a
+part of the lightness and gaiety with which one rises from a French
+dinner ought to be attributed to the time that is consumed at the table.
+The different ingredients have opportunity to dispose of themselves in
+their new abode, and are not crowded together pell-mell, or like papers
+and books in ---- library, as I think they must be after a transatlantic
+meal. As for the point of a mere consumption of food, I take it the palm
+must be given to your Frenchman. I had some amusement to-day in watching
+the different countries. The Americans were nearly all through their
+dinner by the time the first course was removed. All that was eaten
+afterwards was literally, with them, pure makeweight, though they kept a
+hungry look to the last. The English seemed fed even before the dinner
+was begun; and, although the continental powers in general had the art
+of picking till they got to the finger-bowls, none really kept up the
+ball but the Frenchmen. It happened to be Friday, and I was a little
+curious to discover whether the Nuncio came to these places with a
+dispensation in his pocket. He sat next to Madame de Damas, as good a
+Catholic as himself, and I observed them helping themselves to several
+suspicious-looking dishes during the first course. I ought to have told
+you before, that one rarely, almost never, helps his neighbour, at a
+French entertainment. The dishes are usually put on the table, removed
+by the servants to be carved in succession, and handed to the guests to
+help themselves. When the service is perfect, every dish is handed to
+each guest. In the great houses, servants out of livery help to the
+different _plats_, servants in livery holding the dishes, sauces, etc.,
+and changing the plates. I believe it is strictly _haut ton_ for the
+servants in livery to do nothing but assist those out of livery. In
+America it is thought stylish to give liveries; in Europe those who keep
+most servants out of livery are in the highest mode, since these are
+always a superior class of menials. The habits of this quarter of the
+world give servants a very different estimation from that which they
+hold with us. Nobles of high rank are employed about the persons of
+princes; and, although, in this age, they perform no strictly menial
+offices, or only on great occasions, they are, in theory, the servitors
+of the body. Nobles have been even employed by nobles; and it is still
+considered an honour for the child of a physician, or a clergyman, or a
+shopkeeper, in some parts of Europe, to fill a high place in the
+household of a great noble. The body servant, or the _gentleman_, as he
+is sometimes called even in England, of a man of rank, looks down upon a
+mechanic as his inferior. Contrary to all our notions as all this is, it
+is strictly reasonable, when the relative conditions, information,
+habits, and characters of the people are considered. But servants here
+are divided into many classes; for some are scullions, and some are
+entrusted with the keys. It follows that those who maintain most of the
+higher class, who are never in livery, maintain the highest style. To
+say, he keeps a servant out of livery, means, that he keeps a better
+sort of domestic. Mere footmen always wear it; the _maitre d'hotel_, or
+groom of the chambers, and the valet, never.
+
+But to return to the dispensation, I made it a point to taste every dish
+that had been partaken of by the Nuncio and his neighbour; and I found
+that they were all fish; but fish so treated, that they could hardly
+know what to think of themselves. You may remember, however, that an
+Archbishop of Paris was sufficiently complaisant to declare a particular
+duck, of which one of Louis the Sixteenth's aunts was fond, to be fish,
+and, of course, fit to be eaten on fast-days.
+
+The fasting of these people would strike you as singular; for I verily
+believe they eat more of a fast-day than on any other. We engaged a
+governess for the girls not long after our arrival, and she proved to be
+a bigoted Catholic, a furious royalist, and as ignorant as a calf. She
+had been but a few weeks in the house, when I detected her teaching her
+_eleves_ to think Washington an unpardonable rebel, La Fayette a
+monster, Louis XVI. a martyr, and all heretics in the high road to
+damnation. There remained no alternative but to give her a quarter's
+salary, and to get rid of her. By the way, this woman was of a noble
+family, and as such received a small pension from the court. But I kept
+her fully a month longer than I think I otherwise should, to see her eat
+on fast-days. Your aunt had the consideration invariably to order fish
+for her, and she made as much havoc among them as a pike. She always
+commenced the Friday with an extra allowance of fruit, which she was
+eating all the morning; and at dinner she contrived to eat half the
+vegetables and all the fish. One day, by mistake, the soup happened to
+be _gras_ instead of _maigre_, and, after she had swallowed a large
+plateful, I was malicious enough to express my regrets at the mistake. I
+really thought the poor woman was about to disgorge on the spot; but by
+dint of consolation she managed to spare us this scene. So good an
+occasion offering, I ventured to ask her why she fasted at all, as I did
+not see it made any great difference in the sum total of her bodily
+nutriment. She assured me that I did not understand the matter. The
+fruit was merely a "_rafraichissant_" and so counted for nothing; and as
+for the fish and vegetables, I might possibly think them very good
+eating, and, for that matter, so did she, on Thursdays and Saturdays;
+but no sooner did Friday come than she longed for meat. The merit of the
+thing consisted, therefore, more in denying her appetite than in going
+without food. I tried hard to persuade her to take a _cotelette_ with
+me; but the proposition made her shudder, though she admitted that she
+envied me every mouthful I swallowed. The knowledge of this craving did
+not take away my appetite.
+
+Lest you should suppose that I am indulging in the vulgar English slang
+against French governesses, I will add, that our own was the very worst,
+in every respect, I ever saw, in or out of France; and that I have met
+with ladies in this situation every way qualified, by principles,
+attainments, manners, and antecedents, to be received with pleasure in
+the best company of Europe.
+
+Our _connives_ in the Hotel Monaco soon disappeared after the
+_chasse-cafe_, leaving none but the Americans behind them. Men and women
+retired as they came; the latter, however, taking leave, as is always
+required by the punctilios of your sex, except at very large and crowded
+parties, and even then properly; and the former, if alone, getting away
+as quietly as possible. The whole affair was over before nine o'clock,
+at which hour the diplomatic corps was scattered all through Paris.
+
+Previously to this dispersion, however, Mr. Gallatin did me the favour
+to present me to Mr. Canning. The conversation was short, and was
+chiefly on America. There was a sore part in his feelings in consequence
+of a recent negotiation, and he betrayed it. He clearly does not love
+us; but what Englishman does? You will be amused to hear that,
+unimportant in other respects as this little conversation was, it has
+been the means of affecting the happiness of two individuals of high
+station in Great Britain. It would be improper for me to say more; but
+of the fact I can entertain no manner of doubt, and I mention it here
+merely as a curious instance of the manner in which "tall oaks from
+little acorns grow."
+
+I ought to have said that two, instead of one event, followed this
+dinner. The second was our own introduction into European society. The
+how and wherefore it is unnecessary to explain, but some of the
+cleverest and best-bred people of this well-bred and clever capital took
+us by the hand, all "unlettered" as we were, and from that moment,
+taking into consideration our tastes and my health, the question has
+been, not how to get into, but how to keep out of, the great world. You
+know enough of these matters, to understand that, the ice once broken,
+any one can float in the current of society.
+
+This little footing has not been obtained without some _contretems_, and
+I have learned early to understand that wherever there is an Englishman
+in the question, it behoves an American to be reserved, punctilious, and
+sometimes stubborn. There is a strange mixture of kind feeling,
+prejudice, and ill-nature, as respects us, wrought into the national
+character of that people, that will not admit of much mystification.
+That they should not like us, may be natural enough; but if they seek
+the intercourse, they ought, on all occasions, to be made to conduct it
+equally, without annoyance and condescension and on terms of perfect
+equality; conditions, by the way, that are scarcely agreeable to their
+present notions of superiority.[6]
+
+[Footnote 6: The change in this respect during the last ten years is
+_patent_. No European nation has, probably, just at this moment as much
+real respect for America as the English, though it is still mixed with
+great ignorance, and a very sincere dislike. Still, the enterprise,
+activity, and growing power of the country are forcing themselves on the
+attention of our kinsmen; and if the government understood its foreign
+relations as well as it does its domestic, and made a proper exhibition
+of maritime preparation and of maritime force, this people would hold
+the balance in many of the grave questions that are now only in abeyance
+in European politics. Hitherto we have been influenced by every
+vacillation in English interests, and it is quite time to think of
+turning the tables, and of placing, as far as practicable, American
+interests above the vicissitudes of those of other people. The thing is
+more easily done than is commonly imagined, but a party politician is
+rarely a statesman, the subordinate management necessary to the one
+being death to the comprehensive views that belong to the other. The
+peculiar nature of the American institutions, and the peculiar
+geographical situation of the country, moreover, render higher qualities
+necessary, perhaps, to make a statesman here than elsewhere.]
+
+In order to understand why I mention any other than the French, in the
+capital of France, you will remember that there are many thousands of
+foreigners established here, for longer or shorter periods, who, by means
+of their money (a necessary that, relatively, is less abundant with the
+French), materially affect society, contriving to penetrate it in all
+directions, in some way or other.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER VII.
+
+English Jurisprudence.--English Justice.--Justice in
+France.--Continental Jurisprudence.--Juries.--Legal Injustice.--The Bar
+in France.--Precedence of the Law.
+
+
+To JACOB SUTHERLAND, ESQ. NEW YORK.
+
+Your legal pursuits will naturally give you an interest in the subject
+of the state of justice in this part of the world. A correspondence like
+mine would not admit of any very profound analysis of the subject, did I
+possess the necessary learning, which I do not, but I may present a few
+general facts and notions, that will give you some idea of the state of
+this important feature of society. The forms and modes of English
+jurisprudence are so much like our own, as to create the impression that
+the administration of justice is equally free from venality and favour.
+As a whole and when the points at issue reach the higher functionaries
+of the law, I should think this opinion true; but, taking those facts
+that appear in the daily prints, through the police reports and in the
+form of personal narratives, as guides, I should think that there is
+much more oppression, many more abuses, and far more outrages on the
+intention of the law, in the purlieus of the courts in England, through
+the agency of subordinates, than with us. The delays and charges of a
+suit in chancery almost amount to a denial of justice. Quite lately, I
+saw a statement, which went to show that a legacy to a charity of about
+1000_l_., with the interest of some fourteen years, had been consumed in
+this court, with the exception of rather more than 100_l_. This is an
+intolerable state of things, and goes to prove, I think, that, in some
+of its features at least, English jurisprudence is behind that of every
+other free country.
+
+But I have been much impressed lately, by a case that would be likely to
+escape the attention of more regular commentators. A peer of the realm
+having struck a constable on a race-course, is proceeded against, in the
+civil action. The jury found for the plaintiff, damages fifty pounds. In
+summing up, the judge reasoned exactly contrary to what I am inclined to
+think would have been the case had the matter been tried before you. He
+gave it as his opinion that the action was frivolous, and ought never to
+have been brought; that the affair should have been settled out of
+court; and, in short, left the impression that it was not, as such, so
+great a hardship for a constable to be struck by a peer, that his honour
+might not be satisfied with the offering of a guinea or two. The jury
+thought differently; from which I infer that the facts did not sustain
+the judge in his notions. Now, the reasoning at home would, I think,
+have been just the other way. The English judge said, in substance, a
+man of Lord ----'s dignity ought not to have been exposed to this
+action; you would have said, a senator is a law-maker, and owes even a
+higher example of order than common to the community; _he_ insinuated
+that a small reparation ought to suffice, while _you_ would have made
+some strong hints at smart-money.
+
+I mention this case, for I think it rather illustrative of English
+justice. Indeed, it is not easy to see how it well can be otherwise:
+when society is divided into castes, the weak must go to the wall. I
+know that the theory here is quite different, and that one of the boasts
+of England is the equality of its justice; but I am dealing in _facts_,
+and not in theories. In America it is thought, and with proper
+limitations I dare say justly, that the bias of juries, in the very
+lowest courts, is in favour of the poor against the rich; but the right
+of appeal restores the balance, and, in a great degree, secures justice.
+In each case it is the controlling power that does the wrong; in England
+the few, in America the many.
+
+In France, as you probably know, juries are confined to criminal cases.
+The consequence is, a continuance of the old practice of soliciting
+justice. The judge virtually decides in chambers, and he hears the
+parties in chambers, or, in other words, wherever he may choose to
+receive them. The client depends as much on external influence and his
+own solicitations, as on the law and the justice of his case. He visits
+the judge officially, and works upon his mind by all the means in his
+power. You and I have been acquainted intimately from boyhood, and it
+has been my bad luck to have had more to do with the courts than I could
+wish; and yet, in all the freedom of an otherwise unfettered
+intercourse, I have never dared to introduce the subject of any suit in
+which I have been a party. I have been afraid of wounding your sense of
+right, to say nothing of my own, and of forfeiting your esteem, or at
+least, of losing your society. Now had we been Frenchmen, you would have
+expected me to _solicit_ you; you would probably have heard me with the
+bias of an old friend; and my adversary must have been a singularly
+lucky fellow, or you a very honest one, if he did not get the worst of
+it, supposing the case to admit of doubt. Formerly, it was known that
+influence prevailed; bribes were offered and received, and a suit was a
+contest of money and favouritism rather than one of facts and
+principles.
+
+I asked General La Fayette not long since, what he thought of the actual
+condition of France as respects the administration of justice. In most
+political cases he accused the government of the grossest injustice,
+illegality, and oppression. In the ordinary criminal cases he believed
+the intentions of the courts and juries perfectly fair, as, indeed, it
+is difficult to believe they should not be. In the civil suits he
+thought a great improvement had taken place; nor did he believe that
+there now exists much of the ancient corruption. The civil code of
+Napoleon had worked well, and all he complained of was a want of fitness
+between the subordinate provisions of a system invented by a military
+despot for his own support, and the system of _quasi_ liberty that had
+been adopted at the restoration; for the Bourbons had gladly availed
+themselves of all the machinery of power that Napoleon bequeathed to
+France.
+
+A gentleman who heard the conversation afterwards told me the following
+anecdote. A friend of his had long been an unsuccessful suitor in one of
+the higher courts of the kingdom. They met one day in the street, when
+the other told him that an unsealed letter, which he held in his hand,
+contained an offer of a pair of carriage-horses to the wife of the judge
+who had the control of his affair. On being told he dare not take so
+strong a step, M. de ----, my informant, was requested to read the
+letter, to seal it and to put it in the _boite aux lettres_ with his own
+hands, in order to satisfy himself of the actual state of justice in
+France. All this was done, and "I can only add," continued M. de ----,
+"that I afterwards saw the horses in the carriage of Madame ----, and
+that my friend gained his cause." To this anecdote I can only say, I
+tell it exactly as I heard it, and that M. de ---- is a deputy, and one
+of the honestest and simplest-minded men of my acquaintance. It is but
+proper to add, that the judge in question has a bad name, and is little
+esteemed by the bar; but the above-mentioned fact would go to show that
+too much of the old system remains.
+
+In Germany justice bears a better name, though the absence of juries
+generally must subject the suitor to the assaults of personal influence.
+Farther south, report speaks still less favourably of the manner in
+which the laws are interpreted; and, indeed, it would seem to be an
+inevitable consequence of despotism that justice should be abused. One
+hears occasionally of some signal act of moderation and equity on the
+part of monarchies, but the merits of systems are to be proved, not by
+these brilliant _coups de justice_, but by the steady, quiet and regular
+working of the machine, on which men know how to calculate, in which
+they have faith, and which as seldom deceives them as comports with
+human fallibility, rather than by _scenes_ in which the blind goddess is
+made to play a part in a _melodrama_.
+
+On the whole, it is fair to presume that, while public opinion, and that
+intelligence which acts virtually as a bill of rights, even in the most
+despotic governments of Europe, not even excepting Turkey, perhaps, have
+produced a beneficial influence on the courts, the secrecy of their
+proceedings, the irresponsible nature of their trusts (responsible to
+power, and irresponsible to the nation), and the absence of publicity,
+produce precisely the effects that a common-sense view of the facts
+would lead one who understands human nature to expect.
+
+I am no great admirer of the compromising verdicts of juries, in civil
+suits that admit of a question as to amounts. They are an admirable
+invention to settle questions of guilty or not guilty, but an
+enlightened court would, nine times in ten, do more justice in the cases
+just named. Would it not be an improvement to alter the present powers
+of juries, by letting them simply find for or against the suitor,
+leaving the damages to be assessed by regular officers, that might
+resemble masters in chancery? At all events, juries, or some active
+substitute, cannot be safely dispensed with until a people have made
+great progress in the science of publicity, and in a knowledge of the
+general principles connected with jurisprudence.
+
+This latter feature is quite peculiar to America. Nothing has struck me
+more in Europe than the ignorance which everywhere exists on such
+subjects, even among educated people. No one appears to have any
+distinct notions of legal principles, or even of general law, beyond a
+few prominent facts, but the professional men. Chance threw me, not long
+since into the company of three or four exceedingly clever young
+Englishmen. They were all elder sons, and two were the heirs of
+peers.[7] Something was said on the subject of a claim of a gentleman
+with whom I am connected to a large Irish estate. The grandfather of
+this gentleman was the next brother to the incumbent, who died
+intestate. The grandson, however, was defeated in his claim, in
+consequence of its being proved, that the ancestor through whom he
+derived his claim was of the half-blood. My English companions did not
+understand the principle, and when, I explained by adding, that the
+grandfather of the claimant was born of a different mother from the
+last holder in fee, and that he could never inherit at law (unless by
+devise), the estate going to a hundredth cousin of the whole blood in
+preference, or even escheating to the king, they one and all protested
+England had no such law! They were evidently struck with the injustice
+of transferring property that had been acquired by the common ancestor
+of two brothers to a remote cousin, merely because the affinity between
+the sons was only on the father's side although that very father may
+have accumulated the estate; and they could not believe that what struck
+them as so grievous a wrong, could be the law of descents under which
+they lived. Luckily for me, one learned in the profession happened to be
+present, and corroborated the fact. Now all these gentlemen were members
+of parliament; but they were accustomed to leave legal questions of this
+nature to the management of professional men.
+
+[Footnote 7: This absurd and unaccountable provision of the common law
+has since been superseded by a statute regulating descents on a more
+intelligible and just provision. England has made greater advances in
+common sense and in the right, in all such matters, within the last five
+years, than during the previous hundred.]
+
+I mentioned this conversation to another Englishman, who thought the
+difficulty well disposed of by saying, that if property ever escheated
+in this manner, I ought to remember, that the crown invariably bestowed
+it on the natural heir. This struck me as singular reasoning to be used
+by a people who profess to cherish liberty, inasmuch as, to a certain
+degree, it places all the land in the kingdom at the mercy of the
+sovereign. I need not tell you, moreover, that this answer was
+insufficient, as it did not meet the contingency of a remote cousin's
+inheriting to the prejudice of the children of him who earned the
+estate. But habit is all in all with the English in such matters; and
+that which they are accustomed to see and hear, they are accustomed to
+think right.
+
+The bar is rising greatly in public consideration in France. Before the
+revolution there were certain legal families of great distinction; but
+these could scarcely be considered as forming a portion of the regular
+practitioners. Now, many of the most distinguished statesmen, peers, and
+politicians of France, commenced their careers as advocates. The
+practice of public speaking gives them an immense advantage in the
+chambers, and fully half of the most popular debaters are members who
+belong to the profession. New candidates for public favour appear every
+day, and the time is at hand when the fortunes of France, so lately
+controlled by soldiers, will be more influenced by men of this
+profession than by those of all the others. This is a great step in
+moral civilization; for the country that most feels the ascendancy of
+the law, and that least feels that of arms, is nearest to the summit of
+human perfection. When asked which profession takes rank in America, I
+tell them the law in influence, and the church in deference. Some of my
+moustachoed auditors stare at this reply; for here the sword has
+precedence of all others, and the law, with few exceptions, is deemed a
+calling for none but those who are in the secondary ranks of society.
+But, as I have told you, opinion is undergoing a great change in this
+particular. I believe that every efficient man in the present ministry
+is, or has been, a lawyer.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER VIII.
+
+Army of France.--Military Display.--Fete of the Trocadero.--Royal Review.
+--Royal Ordinance.--Dissatisfaction.--Hostile Demonstration.--Dispersion
+of Rioters.--French Cavalry.--Learned Coachman.--Use of Cavalry.--Cavalry
+Operations.--The Conscription.--National Defence.--Napoleon's Marshals.
+--Marshal Soult--Disaffection of the Army.
+
+
+To COL. BANKHEAD, U.S. ARTILLERY.
+
+The army of France obtained so high a reputation, during the wars of the
+revolution and the empire, that you may feel some curiosity to know its
+actual condition. As the Bourbons understand that they have been
+restored to the throne, by the great powers of Europe, if not in
+opposition to the wishes of a majority of Frenchmen, certainly in
+opposition to the wishes of the active portion of the population, and
+consequently to that part of the nation which would be most likely to
+oppose their interests, they have been accused of endeavouring to keep
+the establishments of France so low as to put her at the mercy of any
+new combination of the allies. I should think this accusation, in a
+great degree, certainly unmerited; for France, at this moment, has a
+large and, so far as I can judge, a well-appointed army, and one that is
+charged by the liberal party with being a heavy expense to the nation,
+and that, too, chiefly with the intention of keeping the people in
+subjection to tyranny. But these contradictions are common in party
+politics. It is not easy here to get at statistical facts accurately,
+especially those which are connected with expenditure. Nominally, the
+army is about 200,000 men, but it is whispered that numerous _conges_
+are given, in order to divert the funds that are thus saved to other
+objects. Admitting all this to be true, and it probably is so in part, I
+should think France must have fully 150,000 men embodied, without
+including the National Guards. Paris is pretty well garrisoned, and the
+_casernes_ in the vicinity of the capital are always occupied. It
+appears to me there cannot be less than 20,000 men within a day's march
+of the Tuileries, and there may be half as many more.[8]
+
+[Footnote 8: The sudden disbandment of the guards and other troops in
+1830 greatly diminished the actual force of the country.]
+
+Since our arrival there have been several great military displays, and I
+have made it a point to be present at them all. The first was a _petite
+guerre_,[9] on the plains of Issy, or within a mile of the walls of the
+town. There may have been 15,000 men assembled for the occasion,
+including troops of all arms.
+
+[Footnote 9: Sham-fight.]
+
+One of the first things that struck me at Paris was the careless
+militia-like manner in which the French troops marched about the
+streets. The disorder, irregularity, careless and indifferent style of
+moving, were all exactly such as I have heard laughed at a thousand
+times in our own great body of national defenders. But this is only one
+of many similar instances, in which I have discovered that what has been
+deemed a peculiarity in ourselves, arising from the institutions
+perhaps, is a very general quality belonging rather to man than to any
+particular set of men. Our notions, you will excuse the freedom of the
+remark, are apt to be a little provincial, and every one knows that
+fashion, opinions and tastes only become the more exaggerated the
+farther we remove from the centre of light. In this way, we come to
+think of things in an exaggerated sense, until, like the boy who is
+disappointed at finding a king a man, we form notions of life that are
+anything but natural and true.
+
+I was still so new to all this, however, that I confess I went to the
+plain of Issy expecting to see a new style of manoeuvring, or, at least,
+one very different from that which I had so often witnessed at home, nor
+can I say that in this instance there was so much disappointment. The
+plan of the day did not embrace two parties, but was merely an attack on
+an imaginary position, against which the assailants were regularly and
+scientifically brought up, the victory being a matter of convention. The
+movements were very beautiful, and were made with astonishing spirit and
+accuracy. All idea of disorder or the want of regularity was lost here,
+for entire battalions advanced to the charges without the slightest
+apparent deviation from perfectly mathematical lines.
+
+When we reached the acclivity that overlooked the field, a new line was
+forming directly beneath us, it being supposed that the advance of the
+enemy had already been driven in upon his main body, and the great
+attack was just on the point of commencing.
+
+A long line of infantry of the French guards formed the centre of the
+assailants. Several batteries of artillery were at hand, and divers
+strong columns of horse and foot were held in reserve. A regiment of
+lancers was on the nearest flank, and another of cuirassiers was
+stationed at the opposite. All the men of the royal family were in the
+field, surrounded by a brilliant staff. A gun was fired near them, by
+way of signal, I suppose, when two brigades of artillery galloped
+through the intervals of the line, unlimbered, and went to work as if
+they were in downright earnest. The cannonade continued a short time,
+when the infantry advanced in line, and delivered its fire by companies,
+or battalions, I could not discern which, in the smoke. This lasted some
+ten minutes, when I observed a strong column of troops, dressed in
+scarlet, moving up with great steadiness and regularity from the rear.
+These were the Swiss Guards, and there might have been fifteen hundred
+or two thousand of them. The column divided into two, as it approached
+the rear of the line, which broke into column in turn, and for a minute
+there was a confused crowd of red and blue coats, in the smoke, that
+quite set my nautical instinct at defiance. The cuirassiers chose this
+moment to make a rapid and menacing movement in advance, but without
+opening their column, and some of the artillery reappeared and commenced
+firing at the unoccupied intervals. This lasted a very little while for
+the Swiss deployed into line like clock-work, and then made a quick
+charge, with beautiful precision. Halting, they threw in a heavy fire,
+by battalions; the French guard rallied and formed upon their flanks;
+the whole reserve came up; the cuirassiers and lancers charged, by
+turning the position assailed, and for ten or fifteen minutes there was
+a succession of quick evolutions, which like the _finale_ of a grand
+piece of music, appeared confused even while it was the most scientific,
+and then there was a sudden pause. The position, whose centre was a
+copse, had been carried, and we soon saw the guards formed on the ground
+that was supposed to have been held by the enemy. The artillery still
+fired occasionally, as on a retreating foe, and the lancers and
+cuirassiers were charging and manoeuvring, half a mile farther in
+advance, as if following up their advantage.
+
+Altogether, this was much the prettiest field exercise I ever witnessed.
+There was a unity of plan, a perfection of evolution, and a division of
+_materiel_ about it, that rendered it to my eyes as nearly perfect as
+might be. The troops were the best of France, and the management of the
+whole had been confided to some one accustomed to the field. It
+contained all the poetry, without any of the horrors of a battle. It
+could not possess the heart-stirring interest of a real conflict, and
+yet it was not without great excitement.
+
+Some time after the _petite guerre_ of Issy, the capital celebrated the
+fete of the Trocadero. The Trocadero, you may remember, was the fortress
+of Cadix, carried by assault, under the order of the Dauphin, in the war
+of the late Spanish revolution. This government, which has destroyed all
+the statues of the Emperor, proscribed his family, and obliterated every
+visible mark of his reign in their power, has had the unaccountable
+folly of endeavouring to supplant the military glory acquired under
+Napoleon by that of Louis Antoine, Dauphin of France! A necessary
+consequence of the attempt, is a concentration of all the military
+souvenirs of the day in this affair of the Trocadero. Bold as all this
+will appear to one who has not the advantage of taking a near view of
+what is going on here, it has even been exceeded, through the abject
+spirit of subserviency in those who have the care of public instruction,
+by an attempt to exclude even the name of the Bonaparte from French
+history. My girls have shown me an abridgment of the history of France,
+that has been officially prepared for the ordinary schools, in which
+there is no sort of allusion to him. The wags here say, that a work has
+been especially prepared for the heir presumptive, however, in which the
+Emperor is a little better treated; being spoken of as "a certain
+Marquis de Bonaparte, who commanded the armies of the king."
+
+The mimic attack on the Trocadero, like its great original, was at
+night. The troops assembled in the Champs de Mars, and the assault was
+made, across the beautiful bridge of Jena, on a sharp acclivity near
+Passy, which was the imaginary fortress. The result was a pretty good
+effect of night-firing, some smoke, not a little noise, with a very
+pretty movement of masses. I could make nothing of it, of much interest,
+for the obscurity prevented the eyes from helping the imagination.
+
+Not long since, the king held a great review of regular troops, and of
+the entire body of the National Guards of Paris and its environs. This
+review also took place in the Champs de Mars, and it was said that
+nearly a hundred thousand men were under arms for the occasion. I think
+there might have been quite seventy thousand. These mere reviews have
+little interest, the evolutions being limited to marching by regiments
+on and off the ground. In doing the latter, the troops defile before the
+king. Previously to this, the royal cortege passed along the several
+lines, receiving the usual honours.
+
+On this occasion the Dauphine and the Duchesse de Berri followed the
+king in open carriages, accompanied by the little Duc de Bordeaux and
+his sister. I happened to be at an angle of the field as the royal
+party, surrounded by a showy group of marshals and generals, passed, and
+when there seemed to be a little confusion. As a matter of course, the
+cry of "Vive le roi!" had passed along with the procession; for, popular
+or not, it is always easy for a sovereign to procure this sign of
+affection, or for others to procure it for him. You will readily
+understand that _employes_ of the government are especially directed to
+betray the proper enthusiasm on such occasions. There was however, a cry
+at this corner of the area that did not seem so unequivocally loyal,
+and, on inquiry, I was told that some of the National Guards had cried
+"A bas les ministres!" The affair passed off without much notice,
+however; and I believe it was generally forgotten by the population
+within an hour. The desire to get rid of M. de Villele and his set was
+so general in Paris, that most people considered the interruption quite
+as a matter of course.
+
+The next day the capital was electrified by a royal ordinance,
+disbanding all the National Guards of Paris! A more infatuated, or, if
+it were intended to punish the disaffected, a more unjust decree, could
+not easily have been issued. It was telling the great majority of the
+very class which forms the true force of every government that their
+rulers could not confide in them. As confidence, by awakening pride,
+begets a spirit in favour of those who depend on it, so does obvious
+distrust engender disaffection. But the certainty that Louis XVI. lost
+his throne and his life for the want of decision, has created one of
+those sweeping opinions here of the virtue of energy, that constantly
+leads the rulers into false measures. An act that might have restrained
+the France of 1792, would be certain to throw the France of 1827 into
+open revolt. The present generation of Frenchmen, in a political sense,
+have little in common with even the French of 1814, and measures must be
+suited to the times in which we live. As well might one think of using
+the birch on the man, that had been found profitable with the boy, as to
+suppose these people can be treated like their ancestors.
+
+As might have been expected, a deep, and what is likely to prove a
+lasting discontent, has been the consequence of the blunder. It is
+pretended that the shopkeepers of Paris are glad to be rid of the
+trouble of occasionally mounting guard, and that the affair will be
+forgotten in a short time. All this may be true enough, in part, and it
+would also be true in the whole, were there not a press to keep
+disaffection alive, and to inflame the feelings of those who have been
+treated so cavalierly; for he knows little of human nature who does not
+understand that, while bodies of men commit flagrant wrongs without the
+responsibility being kept in view by their individual members, an
+affront to the whole is pretty certain to be received as an affront to
+each of those who make an integral part.
+
+The immediate demonstrations of dissatisfaction have not amounted to
+much, though the law and medical students paraded the streets, and
+shouted beneath the windows of the ministers the very cry that gave rise
+to the disbandment of the guards. But, if no other consequence has
+followed this exercise of arbitrary power, I, at least, have learned how
+to disperse a crowd. As you may have occasion some days, in your
+military capacity, to perform this unpleasant duty, it may be worth
+while to give you a hint concerning the _modus operandi_.
+
+Happening to pass through the Place Vendome, I found the foot of the
+celebrated column which stands directly in the centre of the square
+surrounded by several hundred students. They were clustered together
+like bees, close to the iron railing which encloses the base of the
+pillar, or around an area of some fifty or sixty feet square. From time
+to time they raised a shout, evidently directed against the ministers,
+of whom one resided at no great distance from the column. As the hotel
+of the Etat-Major of Paris is in this square, and there is always a post
+at it, it soon became apparent there was no intention quietly to submit
+to this insult. I was attracted by a demonstration on the part of the
+_corps de garde_, and, taking a station at no greet distance from the
+students, I awaited the issue.
+
+The guard, some thirty foot soldiers, came swiftly out of the court of
+the hotel, and drew up in a line before its gate. This happened as I
+reached their own side of the square, which I had just crossed.
+Presently, a party of fifteen or twenty _gendarmes a cheval_ came up,
+and wheeled into line. The students raised another shout, as it might
+be, in defiance. The infantry shouldered arms, and, filing off singly,
+headed by an officer, they marched in what we call Indian file, towards
+the crowd. All this was done in the most quiet manner possible, but
+promptly, and with an air of great decision and determination. On
+reaching the crowd, they penetrated it, in the same order, quite up to
+the railing. Nothing was said, nor was anything done; for it would have
+been going farther than the students were prepared to proceed, had they
+attempted to seize and disarm the soldiers. This appeared to be
+understood, and, instead of wasting the moments and exasperating his
+enemies by a parley, the officer, as has just been said, went directly
+through them until he reached the railing. Once there, he began to
+encircle it, followed in the same order by his men. The first turn
+loosened the crowd, necessarily, and then I observed that the muskets,
+which hitherto had been kept at a "carry," were inclined a little
+outwards. Two turns enabled the men to throw their pieces to a charge,
+and, by this time, they had opened their order so far as to occupy the
+four sides of the area. Facing outwards, they advanced very slowly, but
+giving time for the crowd to recede. This manoeuvre rendered the throng
+less and less dense, when, watching their time, the mounted gendarmes
+rode into it in a body, and, making a circuit, on a trot, without the
+line of infantry, they got the mass so loosened and scattered, that,
+unarmed as the students were, had they been disposed to resist, they
+would now have been completely at the mercy of the troops. Every step
+that was gained of course weakened the crowd, and, in ten minutes, the
+square was empty; some being driven out of it in one direction, and some
+in another, without a blow being struck, or even an angry word used. The
+force of the old saying, "that the king's name is a tower of strength,"
+or, the law being on the side of the troops, probably was of some avail;
+but a mob of fiery young Frenchmen is not too apt to look at the law
+with reverence.
+
+I stood near the hotels, but still in the square, when a gendarme,
+sweeping his sabre as one would use a stick in driving sheep, came near
+me. He told me to go away. I smiled, and said I was a stranger, who was
+looking at the scene purely from curiosity. "I see you are, sir," he
+answered, "but you had better fall back into the Rue de la Paix." We
+exchanged friendly nods, and I did as he told me, without further
+hesitation. In truth, there remained no more to be seen.
+
+Certainly, nothing could have been done in better temper, more
+effectually, nor more steadily, than this dispersion of the students.
+There is no want of spirit in these young men, you must know, but the
+reverse is rather the case. The troops were under fifty in number, and
+the mob was between six hundred and a thousand, resolute, active, sturdy
+young fellows, who had plenty of fight in them, but who wanted the unity
+of purpose that a single leader can give to soldiers. I thought this
+little campaign of the column of the Place Vendome quite as good, in its
+way, as the _petite guerre_ of the plains of Issy.
+
+I do not know whether you have fallen into the same error as myself in
+relation to the comparative merits of the cavalry of this part of the
+world, though I think it is one common to most Americans. From the
+excellence of their horses, as well as from that general deference for
+the character and prowess of the nation which exists at home, I had been
+led to believe that the superior qualities of the British cavalry were
+admitted in Europe. This is anything but true; military men, so far as I
+can learn, giving the palm to the Austrian artillery, the British
+infantry, and the French cavalry. The Russians are said to be generally
+good for the purposes of defence, and in the same degree deficient for
+those of attack. Some shrewd observers, however, think the Prussian
+army, once more, the best in Europe.
+
+The French cavalry is usually mounted on small, clumsy, but sturdy
+beasts, that do not show a particle of blood. Their movement is awkward,
+and their powers, for a short effort, certainly are very much inferior
+to those of either England or America. Their superiority must consist in
+their powers of endurance; for the blooded animal soon falls off, on
+scanty fare and bad grooming. I have heard the moral qualities of the
+men given as a reason why the French cavalry should be superior to that
+of England. The system of conscription secures to an army the best
+materials, while that of enlistment necessarily includes the worst. In
+this fact is to be found the real moral superiority of the French and
+Prussian armies. Here, service, even in the ranks, is deemed honourable;
+whereas with us, or in England, it would be certain degradation to a man
+of the smallest pretension to enlist as a soldier, except in moments
+that made stronger appeals than usual to patriotism. In short, it is
+_prima facie_ evidence of a degraded condition for a man to carry a
+musket in a regular battalion. Not so here. I have frequently seen
+common soldiers copying in the gallery of the Louvre, or otherwise
+engaged in examining works of science or of taste; not ignorantly, and
+with vulgar wonder, but like men who had been regularly instructed. I
+have been told that a work on artillery practice lately appeared in
+France, which excited so much surprise by its cleverness, that an
+inquiry was set on foot for its author. He was found seated in a
+cabriolet in the streets, his vocation being that of a driver. What
+renders his knowledge more surprising is the fact, that the man was
+never a soldier at all; but, having a great deal of leisure, while
+waiting for his fares, he had turned his attention to this subject, and
+had obtained all he knew by means of books. Nothing is more common than
+to see the drivers of cabriolets and fiacres reading in their seats; and
+I have even seen market-women, under their umbrellas, _a la Robinson_,
+with books in their hands. You are not, however, to be misled by these
+facts, which merely show the influence of the peculiar literature of the
+country, so attractive and amusing; for a very great majority of the
+French can neither read nor write. It is only in the north that such
+things are seen at all, except among the soldiers, and a large
+proportion of even the French army are entirely without schooling.
+
+To return to the cavalry, I have heard the superiority of the French
+ascribed also to their dexterity in the use of the sabre, or, as it is
+termed here, _l'arme blanche_. After all, this is rather a poetical
+conclusion; for charges of cavalry rarely result in regular hand-to-hand
+conflicts. Like the bayonet, the sabre is seldom used except on an
+unresisting enemy. Still, the consciousness of such a manual superiority
+might induce a squadron less expert to wheel away, or to break, without
+waiting for orders.
+
+I have made the acquaintance, here, of an old English general, who has
+passed all his life in the dragoons, and who commanded brigades of
+cavalry in Spain and at Waterloo. As he is a sensible old man, of great
+frankness and simplicity of character, perfect good breeding and good
+nature, and moreover, so far as I can discover, absolutely without
+prejudice against America, he has quite won my heart, and I have availed
+myself of his kindness to see a good deal of him. We walk together
+frequently, and chat of all things in heaven and earth, just as they
+come uppermost. The other day I asked him to explain the details of a
+charge of his own particular arm to me, of which I confessed a proper
+ignorance. "This is soon done," said the old gentleman, taking my arm
+with a sort of sly humour, as if he were about to relate something
+facetious: "against foot, a charge is a menace; if they break, we profit
+by it; if they stand, we get out of the scrape as well as we can. When
+foot are in disorder, cavalry does the most, and it is always active in
+securing a victory, usually taking most of the prisoners. But as against
+cavalry, there is much misconception. When two regiments assault each
+other, it is in compact line--" "How," I interrupted him, "do not you
+open, so as to leave room to swing a sabre?" "Not at all. The theory is
+knee to knee; but this is easier said than done, in actual service. I
+will suppose an unsuccessful charge. We start, knee to knee, on a trot.
+This loosens the ranks, and, as we increase the speed, they become still
+looser. We are under the fire of artillery, or, perhaps, of infantry,
+all the time, and the enemy won't run. At this moment, a clever officer
+will command a retreat to be sounded. If he should not, some officer is
+opportunely killed, or some leading man loses command of his horse,
+which is wounded and wheels, the squadron follows, and we get away as
+well as we can. The enemy follows, and if he catches us, we are cut up.
+Other charges do occur; but this is the common history of cavalry
+against cavalry, and, in unsuccessful attacks of cavalry, against
+infantry too. A knowledge of the use of the sword is necessary; for did
+your enemy believe you ignorant of it, he would not fly; but the weapon
+itself is rarely used on such occasions. Very few men are slain in their
+ranks by the bayonet or the sabre."
+
+I was once told, though not directly by an officer, that the English
+dragoon neglected his horse in the field, selling the provender for
+liquor, and that, as a consequence, the corps became inefficient;
+whereas the French dragoon, being usually a sober man, was less exposed
+to this temptation. This may, or may not, be true; but drunkenness is
+now quite common in the French army, though I think much less so in the
+cavalry than in the foot. The former are generally selected with some
+care, and the common regiments of the line, as a matter of course,
+receive the refuse of the conscription.
+
+This conscription is after all, extremely oppressive and unjust, though
+it has the appearance of an equal tax. Napoleon had made it so
+unpopular, by the inordinate nature of his demands for men, that Louis
+XVIII. caused an article to be inserted in the charter, by which it was
+to be altogether abolished. But a law being necessary to carry out this
+constitutional provision, the clause remains a perfect dead letter, it
+being no uncommon thing for the law to be stronger than the constitution
+even in America, and quite a common thing here. I will give you an
+instance of the injustice of the system. An old servant of mine has been
+drafted for the cavalry. I paid this man seven hundred francs a year,
+gave him coffee, butter, and wine, with his food, and he fell heir to a
+good portion of my old clothes. The other day he came to see me, and I
+inquired into his present situation. His arms and clothes were found
+him. He got neither coffee, wine, nor butter; and his other food, as a
+matter of course, was much inferior to that he had been accustomed to
+receive with me. His pay, after deducting the necessary demands on it in
+the shape of regular contributions, amounts to about two sous a day,
+instead of the two francs he got in my service.
+
+Now, necessity, in such matters, is clearly the primary law. If a
+country cannot exist without a large standing army, and the men are not
+to be had by voluntary enlistments, a draft is probably the wisest and
+best regulation for its security. But, taking this principle as the
+basis of the national defence, a just and a paternal government would
+occupy itself in equalizing the effects of the burden, as far as
+circumstances would in any manner admit. The most obvious and efficient
+means would be by raising the rate of pay to the level, at least, of a
+scale that should admit of substitutes being obtained at reasonable
+rates. This is done with us, where a soldier receives a full ration, all
+his clothes, and sixty dollars a year.[10] It is true, that this would
+make an army very costly, and, to bear the charge, it might be necessary
+to curtail some of the useless magnificence and prodigality of the other
+branches of the government; and herein is just the point of difference
+between the expenditures of America and those of France. It must be
+remembered, too, that a really free government, by enlisting the popular
+feeling in its behalf through its justice, escapes all the charges that
+are incident to the necessity of maintaining power by force, wanting
+soldiers for its enemies without, and not for its enemies within. We
+have no need of a large standing army, on account of our geographical
+position, it is true; but had we the government of France, we should not
+find that our geographical position exempted us from the charge.
+
+[Footnote 10: He now receives seventy-two.]
+
+You have heard a great deal of the celebrated soldiers who surrounded
+Napoleon, and whose names have become almost as familiar to us as his
+own. I do not find that the French consider the marshals men of singular
+talents. Most of them reached their high stations on account of their
+cleverness in some particular branch of their duties, and by their
+strong devotion, in the earlier parts of their career, to their master.
+Marechal Soult has a reputation for skill in managing the civil detail
+of service. As a soldier, he is also distinguished for manoeuvring in
+the face of his enemy, and under fire. Some such excitement appears
+necessary to arouse his dormant talents. Suchet is said to have had
+capacity; but, I think, to Massena, and to the present King of Sweden,
+the French usually yield the palm in this respect. Davoust was a man of
+terrible military energy, and suited to certain circumstances, but
+scarcely a man of talents. It was to him Napoleon said, "remember, you
+have but a single friend in France--myself; take care you do not lose
+him." Lannes seems to have stood better than most of them as a soldier,
+and Macdonald as a man. But, on the whole, I think it quite apparent
+there was scarcely one among them all calculated to have carried out a
+very high fortune for himself, without the aid of the directing genius
+of his master. Many of them had ambition enough for anything; but it was
+an ambition stimulated by example, rather than by a consciousness of
+superiority.
+
+In nothing have I been more disappointed than in the appearance of these
+men. There is more or less of character about the exterior and
+physiognomy of them all, it is true; but scarcely one has what we are
+accustomed to think the carriage of a soldier. It may be known to you
+that Moreau had very little of this, and really one is apt to fancy he
+can see the civic origin in nearly all of them. While the common French
+soldiers have a good deal of military coquetry, the higher officers
+appear to be nearly destitute of it. Marechal Molitor is a fine man;
+Marechal Marmont, neat, compact, and soldierly-looking; Marechal
+Mortier, a grenadier without grace; Marechal Oudinot, much the same; and
+so on to the end of the chapter. Lamarque is a little swarthy man, with
+good features and a keen eye; but he is military in neither carriage nor
+mien.
+
+Crossing the Pont Royal, shortly after my arrival, in company with a
+friend, the latter pointed out to me a stranger, on the opposite
+side-walk, and desired me to guess who and what he might be. The subject
+of my examination was a compact, solidly-built man, with a plodding
+rustic air, and who walked a little lame. After looking at him a minute,
+I guessed he was some substantial grazier, who had come to Paris on
+business connected with the supplies of the town. My friend laughed, and
+told me it was Marshal Soult. To my inexperienced eye, he had not a bit
+of the exterior of a soldier, and was as unlike the engravings we see of
+the French heroes as possible. But here, art is art; and like the man
+who was accused of betraying another into a profitless speculation by
+drawing streams on his map, when the land was without any, and who
+defended himself by declaring no one ever saw a _map_ without streams,
+the French artists appear to think every one should be represented in
+his ideal character, let him be as _bourgeois_ as he may in truth. I
+have seen Marshal Soult in company, and his face has much character. The
+head is good, and the eye searching, the whole physiognomy possessing
+those latent fires that one would be apt to think would require the
+noise and excitement of a battle to awaken. La Fayette looks more like
+an old soldier than any of them. Gerard, however, is both a handsome man
+and of a military mien.
+
+Now and then we see a _vieux moustache_ in the guards; but, on the
+whole, I have been much surprised at finding how completely the army of
+this country is composed of young soldiers. The campaigns of Russia, of
+1813, 1814, and of 1815, left few besides conscripts beneath the eagles
+of Napoleon. My old servant Charles tells me that the guardhouse is
+obliged to listen to tales of the campaign of Spain, and of the
+Trocadero!
+
+The army of France is understood to be very generally disaffected. The
+restoration has introduced into it, in the capacity of general officers,
+many who followed the fortunes of the Bourbons into exile, and some, I
+believe, who actually fought against this country in the ranks of her
+enemies. This may be, in some measure, necessary, but it is singularly
+unfortunate.
+
+I have been told, on good authority, that, since the restoration of
+1815, several occasions have occurred, when the court thought itself
+menaced with a revolution. On all these occasions the army, as a matter
+of course, has been looked to with hope or with distrust. Investigation
+is said to have always discovered so bad a spirit, that little reliance
+is placed on its support.
+
+The traditions of the service are all against the Bourbons. It is true,
+that very few of the men who fought at Marengo and Austerlitz still
+remain; but then the recollection of their deeds forms the great delight
+of most Frenchmen. There is but one power that can counteract this
+feeling, and it is the power of money. By throwing itself into the arms
+of the industrious classes, the court might possibly obtain an ally,
+sufficiently strong to quell the martial spirit of the nation; but, so
+far from pursuing such a policy, it has all the commercial and
+manufacturing interests marshalled against it, because it wishes to
+return to the _bon vieux tems_ of the old system.
+
+After all, I much question if any government in France will have the army
+cordially with it, that does not find it better employment than
+mock-fights on the plain of Issy, and night attacks on the mimic
+Trocadero.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER IX.
+
+Royal Dinner.--Magnificence and Comfort.--Salle de Diane.--Prince de
+Conde.--Duke of Orleans.--The Dinner-table.--The Dauphin.--Sires de
+Coucy.--The Dauphine.--Ancient Usages--M. de Talleyrand.--Charles X.
+--Panoramic Procession.--Droll Effect.--The Dinner.--M. de Talleyrand's
+Office.--The Duchesse de Berri.--The Catastrophe.--An Aristocratic
+Quarrel.
+
+
+To MRS. SINGLETON W. BEALL, GREEN BAY.
+
+We have lately witnessed a ceremony that may have some interest for one
+who, like yourself, dwells in the retirement of a remote frontier post.
+It is etiquette for the kings of France to dine in public twice in the
+year, viz. the 1st of January, and the day that is set apart for the
+fete of the king. Having some idle curiosity to be present on one of
+these occasions, I wrote the usual note to the lord in, waiting, or, as
+he is called here, "le premier gentilhomme de la chambre du roi, de
+service," and we got the customary answer, enclosing us tickets of
+admission. There are two sorts of permissions granted on these
+occasions: by one you are allowed to remain in the room during the
+dinner; and by the other, you are obliged to walk slowly through the
+salle, in at one side and out at the other, without, however, being
+suffered to pause even for a moment. Ours were of the former
+description.
+
+The King of France having the laudable custom of being punctual, and as
+every one dines in Paris at six, that best of all hours for a town life,
+we were obliged to order our own dinner an hour earlier than common, for
+looking at others eating on an empty stomach is, of all amusements, the
+least satisfactory. Having taken this wise precaution, we drove to the
+chateau at half after five, it not being seemly to enter the room after
+the king, and, as we discovered, for females impossible.
+
+Magnificence and comfort seldom have much in common. We were struck with
+this truth on entering the palace of the king of France. The room into
+which we were first admitted was filled with tall, lounging foot
+soldiers, richly attired, but who lolled about the place with their caps
+on, and with a barrack-like air that seemed to us singularly in contrast
+with the prompt and respectful civility with which one is received in
+the ante-chamber of a private hotel. It is true that we had nothing to
+do with the soldiers and lackeys who thronged the place; but if their
+presence was intended to impress visitors with the importance of their
+master, I think a more private entrance would have been most likely to
+produce that effect; for I confess, that it appeared to me has a mark of
+poverty, that troops being necessary to the state and security of the
+monarch, he was obliged to keep them in the vestibule by which his
+guests entered. But this is royal state. Formerly, the executioner was
+present; and in the semi-barbarous courts of the East, such is the fact
+even now. The soldiers were a party of the Hundred Swiss; men chosen for
+their great stature, and remarkable for the perfection of their musket.
+Two of them were posted as sentinels at the foot of the great staircase
+by which we ascended, and we passed several more on the landings.
+
+We were soon in the Salle des Gardes, or the room which the _gardes du
+corps_ on service occupied. Two of these _quasi_ soldiers were also
+acting as sentinels here, while others lounged about the room. Their
+apartment communicated with the Salle de Diane, the hall or gallery
+prepared for the entertainment. I had no other means but the eye of
+judging of the dimensions of this room; but its length considerably
+exceeds a hundred feet, and its breadth is probably forty, or more. It
+is of the proper height, and the ceiling is painted in imitation of
+those of the celebrated Farnese Palace at Rome.
+
+We found this noble room divided, by a low railing, into three
+compartments. The centre, an area of some thirty feet by forty,
+contained the table, and was otherwise prepared for the reception of the
+court. On one side of it were raised benches for the ladies, who were
+allowed to be seated; and, on the other, a vacant space for the
+gentlemen, who stood. All these, you will understand, were considered
+merely as spectators, not being supposed to be in the presence of the
+king. The mere spectators were dressed as usual, or in common evening
+dress, and not all the women even in that; while those within the
+railings, being deemed to be in the royal presence, were in high court
+dresses. Thus I stood for an hour within five-and-twenty feet of the
+king, and part of the time much nearer, while, by a fiction of
+etiquette, I was not understood to be there at all. I was a good while
+within ten feet of the Duchesse de Berri, while, by convention, I was
+nowhere. There was abundance of room in our area, and every facility of
+moving about, many coming and going, as they saw fit. Behind us, but at
+a little distance, were other rows of raised seats, filled with the best
+instrumental musicians of Paris. Along the wall, facing the table, was a
+narrow raised platform, wide enough to allow of two or three to walk
+abreast, separated from the rest of the room by a railing, and extending
+from a door at one end of the gallery, to a door at the other. This was
+the place designed for the passage of the public during the dinner; no
+one, however, being admitted, even here, without a ticket.
+
+A gentleman of the court led your aunt to the seats reserved for the
+female spectators, which were also without the railing, and I took my
+post among the men. Although the court of the Tuileries was, when we
+entered the palace, filled with a throng of those who were waiting to
+pass through the Gallery of Diana, to my surprise, the number of persons
+who were to remain in the room was very small. I account for the
+circumstance, by supposing, that it is not etiquette for any who have
+been presented to attend, unless they are among the court; and, as some
+reserve was necessary in issuing these tickets, the number was
+necessarily limited. I do not think there were fifty men on our side,
+which might have held several hundred; and the seats of the ladies were
+not half filled. Boxes were fitted up in the enormous windows, which
+closed and curtained, a family of fine children occupying that nearest
+to me. Some one said they were the princes of the house of Orleans; for
+none of the members of the royal family have seats at the _grands
+couverts_, as these dinners are called, unless they belong to the
+reigning branch. There is but one Bourbon prince more remote from the
+crown[11] than the Duc d'Orleans, and this is the Prince de Conde, or, as
+he is more familiarly termed here, the Duc de Bourbon, the father of the
+unfortunate Duc d'Enghien. So broad are the distinctions made between
+the sovereign and the other members of his family in these governments,
+that it was the duty of the Prince de Conde to appear to-day behind the
+king's chair, as the highest dignitary of his household; though it was
+understood that he was excused, on account of his age and infirmities.
+These broad distinctions, you will readily imagine, however, are only
+maintained on solemn and great state occasions; for, in their ordinary
+intercourse, kings nowadays dispense with most of the ancient
+formalities of their rank. It would have been curious, however, to see
+one descendant of St. Louis standing behind the chair of another, as a
+servitor; and more especially, to see the Prince de Conde standing
+behind the chair of Charles X.; for, when Comte d'Artois and Duc de
+Bourbon, some fifty years since, they actually fought a duel on account
+of some slight neglect of the wife of the latter by the former.
+
+[Footnote 11: 1827]
+
+The crown of France, as you know, passes only in the male line. The Duke
+of Orleans is descended from Louis XIII., and the Prince de Conde from
+Louis IX. In the male line, the Duke of Orleans is only the fourth
+cousin, once removed, of the king, and the Prince de Conde the eighth or
+ninth. The latter would be even much more remotely related to the crown,
+but for the accession of his own branch of the family in the person of
+Henry IV. who was a near cousin of his ancestor. Thus you perceive,
+while royalty is always held in reverence--for any member of the family
+may possibly become the king--still there are broad distinctions made
+between the near and the more distant branches of the line. The Duke of
+Orleans fills that equivocal position in the family, which is rather
+common in the history of this species of government. He is a liberal,
+and is regarded with distrust by the reigning branch, and with hope by
+that portion of the people who think seriously of the actual state of
+the country. A saying of M. de Talleyrand, however, is circulated at his
+expense, which, if true, would go to show that this wary prince is not
+disposed to risk his immense fortune in a crusade for liberty. "Ce n'est
+pas assez d'etre quelqu'un--il faut etre quelque chose," are the words
+attributed to the witty and wily politician; but, usually, men have
+neither half the wit nor half the cunning that popular accounts ascribe
+to them, when it becomes the fashion to record their acts and sayings. I
+believe the Duke of Orleans holds no situation about the court, although
+the king has given him the title of _Royal_ Highness, his birth
+entitling him to be styled no more than _Serene_ Highness. This act of
+grace is much spoken of by the Bourbonists, who consider it a favour
+that for ever secures the loyalty and gratitude of the Duke. The
+Duchess, being the daughter of a king, had this rank from her birth.
+
+The orchestra was playing when we entered the Gallery of Diana, and
+throughout the whole evening it gave us, from time to time, such music
+as can only be found in a few of the great capitals of Europe.
+
+The covers were laid, and every preparation was made within the railing
+for the reception of the _convives_. The table was in the shape of a
+young moon, with the horns towards the spectators, or from the wall. It
+was of some length, and as there were but four covers, the guests were
+obliged to be seated several feet from each other. In the centre was an
+armchair, covered with crimson velvet, and ornamented with a crown; this
+was for the king. A chair without arms, on his right, was intended for
+the Dauphin; another on his left, for the Dauphine; and the fourth,
+which was still further on the right of the Dauphin, was intended for
+Madame, as she is called, or the Duchess of Berri. These are the old and
+favourite appellations of the monarchy, and, absurd as some of them are,
+they excite reverence and respect from their antiquity. Your Wolverines,
+and Suckers, and Buckeyes, and Hooziers would look amazed to hear an
+executive styled the White Fish of Michigan, or the Sturgeon of
+Wisconsin; and yet there is nothing more absurd in it, in the abstract,
+than the titles that were formerly given in Europe, some of which have
+descended to our times. The name of the country, as well as the title of
+the sovereign, in the case of Dauphine, was derived from the same
+source. Thus, in homely English, the Dolphin of Dolphinstown, renders
+"le Dauphin de Dauphine" perfectly well. The last independent Dauphin,
+in bequeathing his states to the King of France of the day, (the
+unfortunate John, the prisoner of the Black Prince,) made a condition
+that the heir apparent of the kingdom should always be known by his own
+title, and consequently, ever since, the appellation has been continued.
+You will understand, that none but an _heir-apparent_ is called the
+Dauphin, and not an _heir-presumptive_. Thus, should the present Dauphin
+and the Duc de Bordeaux die, the Duke of Orleans, according to a treaty
+of the time of Louis XIV., though not according to the ancient laws of
+the monarchy, would become _heir-presumptive_; but he could never be the
+Dauphin, since, should the king marry again, and have another son, his
+rights would be superseded. None but the _heir-apparent_, or the
+_inevitable_ heir, bears this title. There were formerly _Bears_ in
+Belgium, who were of the rank of Counts. These appellations were derived
+from the arms, the Dauphin now bearing dolphins with the lilies of
+France. The Boar of Ardennes got his _sobriquet_ from bearing the head
+of a wild boar in his arms. There were formerly many titles in France
+that are now extinct, such as Captal, Vidame, and Castellan, all of
+which were general, I believe, and referred to official duties. There
+was, however, formerly, a singular proof of how even simplicity can
+exalt a man, when the fashion runs into the opposite extremes. In the
+thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, there existed in France powerful
+noblemen, the owners and lords of the castle and lands of Coucy or
+Couci, who were content to bear the appellation of Sire, a word from
+which our own "Sir" is derived, and which means, like Sir, the simplest
+term of courtesy that could be used. These Sires de Coucy were so
+powerful as to make royal alliances; they waged war with their
+sovereign, and maintained a state nearly royal. Their pride lay in their
+antiquity, independence, and power; and they showed their contempt for
+titles by their device, which is said to have been derived from the
+answer of one of the family to the sovereign, who, struck with the
+splendour of his appearance and the number of his attendants, had
+demanded, "What king has come to my court?" This motto, which is still
+to be seen on the ancient monuments of the family, reads:--
+
+      "Je ne suis roi, ne prince, ne duc, ne comte aussi;
+                Je suis le Sire de Coucy."[12]
+
+[Footnote 12: "I am neither king, nor prince, nor duke, nor even a count;
+I am M. de Coucy."]
+
+This greatly beats Coke of Holkham, of whom it is said that George IV.,
+who had been a liberal in his youth, and the friend of the great Norfolk
+commoner, vexed by his bringing up so many liberal addresses,
+threatened--"If Coke comes to me with any more of his Whig petitions,
+_I'll Knight him_."
+
+I have often thought that this simplicity of the Sires de Coucy
+furnishes an excellent example for our own ministers and citizens when
+abroad. Instead of attempting to imitate the gorgeous attire of their
+colleagues, whose magnificence, for the want of stars and similar
+conventional decorations, they can never equal, they should go to court
+as they go to the President's House, in the simple attire of American
+gentlemen. If any prince should inquire,--"Who is this that approaches
+me, clad so simply that I may mistake him for a butler, or a groom of
+the chambers?" let him answer, "Je ne suis roi, ne prince, ne duc, ne
+comte aussi--I am the minister of the United States of Ameri_key_," and
+leave the rest to the millions at home. My life for it, the question
+would not be asked twice. Indeed, no man who is truly fit to represent
+the republic would ever have any concern about the matter. But all this
+time the dinner of the King of France is getting cold.
+
+We might have been in the gallery fifteen minutes, when there was a stir
+at a door on the side where the females were seated, and a _huissier_
+cried out--"Madame la Dauphine!" and, sure enough, the Dauphine
+appeared, followed by two _dames d'honneur_. She walked quite through
+the gallery, across the area reserved for the court, and passed out at
+the little gate in the railing which communicated with our side of the
+room, leaving the place by the same door at which we had entered. She
+was in high court dress, with diamonds and lappets, and was proceeding
+from her own apartments, in the other wing of the palace, to those of
+the king. As she went within six feet of me, I observed her hard and yet
+saddened countenance with interest; for she has the reputation of
+dwelling on her early fortunes, and of constantly anticipating evil. Of
+course she was saluted by all in passing, but she hardly raised her eyes
+from the floor; though, favoured by my position, I got a slight,
+melancholy smile, in return for my own bow.
+
+The Dauphine had scarcely disappeared, when her Royal Highness, Madame,
+was announced, and the Duchess of Berri went through in a similar
+manner. Her air was altogether less constrained, and she had smiles and
+inclinations for all she passed. She is a slight, delicate, little
+woman, with large blue eyes, a fair complexion, and light hair. She
+struck me as being less a Bourbon than an Austrian, and, though wanting
+in _embonpoint_, she would be quite pretty but for a cast in one of her
+eyes.
+
+A minute or two later, we had Monseigneur le Dauphin, who passed through
+the gallery in the same manner as his wife and sister-in-law. He had
+been reviewing some troops, and was in the uniform of a colonel of the
+guards; booted to the knees, and carrying a military hat in his hand. He
+is not of commanding presence, though I think he has the countenance of
+an amiable man, and his face is decidedly Bourbon. We were indebted to
+the same lantern like construction of the palace, for this preliminary
+glimpse at so many of the actors in the coming scene.
+
+After the passage of the Dauphin, a few courtiers and superior officers
+of the household began to appear within the railed space. Among them
+were five or six duchesses. Women of this rank have the privilege of
+being seated in the presence of the king on state occasions, and
+_tabourets_ were provided for them accordingly. A _tabouret_ is a
+stuffed stool, nearly of the form of the ancient cerulean chair, without
+its back, for a back would make it a chair at once, and, by the
+etiquette of courts, these are reserved for the blood-royal,
+ambassadors, etc. As none but duchesses could be seated at the _grand
+couvert_, you may be certain none below that rank appeared. There might
+have been a dozen present. They were all in high court dresses. One, of
+great personal charms and quite young, was seated near me, and my
+neighbour, an old _abbe_, carried away by enthusiasm, suddenly exclaimed
+to me--"Quelle belle fortune, monsieur, d'etre jeune, jolie, et
+duchesse!" I dare say the lady had the same opinion of the matter.
+
+Baron Louis, not the financier, but the king's physician, arrived. It
+was his duty to stand behind the king's chair, like Sancho's tormentor,
+and see that he did not over-eat himself. The ancient usages were very
+tender of the royal person. If he travelled, he had a spare litter, or a
+spare coach, to receive him, in the event of accident,--a practice that
+is continued to this day; if he ate, there was one to taste his food,
+lest he might be poisoned; and when he lay down to sleep, armed
+sentinels watched at the door of his chamber. Most of these usages are
+still continued, in some form or other, and the ceremonies which are
+observed at these public dinners are mere memorials of the olden time.
+
+I was told the following anecdote by Mad. de ----, who was intimate with
+Louis XVIII. One day, in taking an airing, the king was thirsty, and
+sent a footman to a cottage for water. The peasants appeared with some
+grapes, which they offered, as the homage of their condition. The king
+took them and ate them, notwithstanding the remonstrances of his
+attendants. This little incident was spoken of at court, where all the
+monarch does and says becomes matter of interest, and the next time Mad.
+de ---- was admitted, she joined her remonstrances to those of the other
+courtiers. "We no longer live in an age when kings need dread
+assassins," said Louis, smiling. A month passed, and Mad. de ---- was
+again admitted. She was received with a melancholy shake of the head,
+and with tears. The Duc de Berri had been killed in the interval!
+
+A few gentlemen, who did not strictly belong to the court, appeared
+among the duchesses, but, at the most, there were but six or eight. One
+of them, however, was the gayest looking personage I ever saw in the
+station of a gentleman, being nothing but lace and embroidery, even to
+the seams of his coat; a sort of genteel harlequin. The _abbe_, who
+seemed to understand himself, said he was a Spanish grandee.
+
+I was near the little gate, when an old man, in a strictly court dress,
+but plain and matter-of-fact in air, made an application for admittance.
+In giving way for him to pass, my attention was drawn to his appearance.
+The long white hair that hung down his face, the _cordon bleu_, the lame
+foot, the imperturbable countenance, and the _unearthly aspect_, made me
+suspect the truth. On inquiring, I was right. It was M. de Talleyrand!
+He came as grand chamberlain, to officiate at the dinner of his master.
+
+Everything, in a court, goes by clock-work. Your little great may be out
+of time, and affect a want of punctuality, but a rigid attention to
+appointments is indispensable to those who are really in high
+situations. A failure in this respect would produce the same impression
+on the affairs of men, that a delay in the rising of the sun would
+produce on the day. The appearance of the different personages named,
+all so near each other, was the certain sign that one greater than all
+could not be far behind. They were the dawn of the royal presence.
+Accordingly, the door which communicated with the apartments of the
+king, and the only one within the railed space, opened with the
+announcement of "Le service du Roi," when a procession of footmen of the
+palace appeared, bearing the dishes of the first course. All the
+vessels, whether already on the table, or those in their hands, were of
+gold, richly wrought, or, at least, silver gilt, I had no means of
+knowing which; most probably they were of the former metal. The dishes
+were taken from the footmen by pages, of honour in scarlet dresses, and
+by them placed in order on the table. The first course was no sooner
+ready, than we heard the welcome announcement of "Le Roi." The family
+immediately made their appearance, at the same door by which the service
+had entered. They were followed by a proper number of lords and ladies
+in waiting. Every one arose, as a matter of course, even to the "jeunes,
+jolies, et duchesses;" and the music, as became it, gave us a royal
+crash. The huissier, in announcing the king, spoke in a modest voice,
+and less loud, I observed, than in announcing the Dauphin and the
+ladies. It was, however, a different person; and it is probable one was
+a common huissier, and the other a gentleman acting in that character.
+
+Charles X. is tall, without being of a too heavy frame, flexible of
+movement, and decidedly graceful. By remembering that he is king, and
+the lineal chief of the ancient and powerful family of the Bourbons, by
+deferring properly to history and the illusions of the past, and by
+feeling _tant soit peu_ more respect for those of the present day than
+is strictly philosophical, or perhaps wise, it is certainly possible to
+fancy that he has a good deal of that peculiar port and majesty that the
+poetry of feeling is so apt to impute to sovereigns. I know not whether
+it is the fault of a cynical temperament, or of republican prejudices,
+but I can see no more, about him than the easy grace of an old
+gentleman, accustomed all his life to be a principal personage among the
+principal personages of the earth. This you may think was quite
+sufficient,--but it aid not altogether satisfy the _exigence_ of my
+unpoetical ideas. His countenance betrayed, a species of vacant
+_bonhommie_, rather than of thought or dignity of mind; and while he
+possessed, in a singular degree, the mere physical machinery of his
+rank, he was wanting in the majesty of character and expression, without
+which no man can act well the representation of royalty. Even a little
+more severity of aspect would have better suited the part, and rendered
+_le grand couvert encore plus grand_.
+
+The king seated himself, after receiving the salutations of the
+courtiers within the railing, taking no notice however, of those who, by
+a fiction of etiquette, were not supposed to be in his presence. The
+rest of the family occupied their respective places in the order I have
+named, and the eating and drinking began, from the score. The different
+courses were taken off and served by footmen and pages in the manner
+already described, which, after all, by substituting servants out of
+livery for pages, is very much the way great dinners are served, in
+great houses, all over Europe.
+
+As soon as the king was seated, the north door of the gallery, or that
+on the side opposite to the place where I had taken post, was opened,
+and the public was admitted, passing slowly through the room without
+stopping. A droller _melange_ could not be imagined than presented
+itself in the panoramic procession; and long before the _grand couvert_
+was over, I thought it much the most amusing part of the scene. Very
+respectable persons, gentlemen certainly, and I believe in a few
+instances ladies, came in this way, to catch a glimpse of the spectacle.
+I saw several men that I knew, and the women with them could have been
+no other than their friends. To these must be added, _cochers de
+fiacres_ in their glazed hats, _bonnes_ in their high Norman caps,
+peasants, soldiers in their shakos, _epiciers_ and _garcons_ without
+number. The constant passage, for it lasted without intermission for an
+hour and a half, of so many queer faces, reminded me strongly of one of
+those mechanical panoramas, that bring towns, streets, and armies,
+before the spectator. One of the droll effects of this scene was
+produced by the faces, all of which turned, like sunflowers, towards the
+light of royalty, as the bodies moved steadily on. Thus, on entering,
+the eyes were a little inclined to the right; as they got nearer to the
+meridian, they became gradually bent more aside; when opposite the
+table, every face, was _full_; and, in retiring, all were bent backwards
+over their owners' shoulders, constantly offering a dense crowd of
+faces, looking towards a common centre, while the bodies were coming on,
+or moving slowly off the stage. This, you will see, resembled in some
+measure the revolutions of the moon around our orb, matter and a king
+possessing the same beneficent attraction. I make no doubt, these good
+people thought we presented a curious spectacle; but I am persuaded they
+presented one that was infinitely more so.
+
+I had seen in America, in divers places, an Englishman, a colonel in the
+army. We had never been introduced, but had sat opposite to each other
+at _tables d'hotes_, jostled each other in the President's House, met in
+steam-boats, in the streets, and in many other places, until it was
+evident our faces were perfectly familiar to both parties; and yet we
+never nodded, spoke, or gave any other sign of recognition, than by
+certain knowing expressions of the eyes. In Europe, the colonel
+reappeared. We met in London, in Paris, in the public walks, in the
+sight-seeing places of resort, until we evidently began to think
+ourselves a couple of Monsieur Tonsons. To-night, as I was standing near
+the public platform, whose face should appear in the halo of
+countenances but that of my colonel! The poor fellow had a wooden leg,
+and he was obliged to stump on in his orbit as well as he could, while I
+kept my eye on him, determined to catch a look of recognition if
+possible. When he got so far forward as to bring me in his line of
+sight, our eyes met, and he smiled involuntarily. Then he took a
+deliberate survey of my comfortable position, and he disappeared in the
+horizon, with some such expression on his features as must have belonged
+to Commodore Trunnion, when he called out to Hatchway, while the hunter
+was leaping over the lieutenant, "Oh! d--n you; you are well anchored!"
+
+I do not think the dinner, in a culinary point of view, was anything
+extraordinary. The king ate and drank but little, for, unlike his two
+brothers and predecessors, he is said to be abstemious. The Daupin
+played a better knife and fork; but on the whole, the execution was by
+no means great for Frenchmen. The guests sat so far apart, and the music
+made so much noise, that conversation was nearly out of the question;
+though the King and the Dauphin exchanged a few words in the course of
+the evening. Each of the gentlemen, also, spoke once or twice to his
+female neighbour, and that was pretty much the amount of the discourse.
+The whole party appeared greatly relieved by having something to do
+during the desert, in admiring the service, which was of the beautiful
+Sevres china. They all took up the plates, and examined them
+attentively; and really I was glad they had so rational an amusement to
+relieve their _ennui_.
+
+Once, early in the entertainment, M. de Talleyrand approached the king,
+and showed him the bill of fare! It was an odd spectacle to see this old
+_diplomate_ descending to the pantomime of royalty, and acting the part
+of a _maitre d'hotel_. Had the duty fallen on Cambaceres, one would
+understand it, and fancy that it might be well done. The king smiled on
+him graciously, and, I presume, gave him leave to retire; for soon after
+this act of loyal servitude, the prince disappeared. As for M. Louis, he
+treated Charles better than his brother treated Sancho; for I did not
+observe the slightest interference, on his part, during the whole
+entertainment; though one of those near me said he had tasted a dish or
+two by way of ceremony,--an act of precaution that I did not myself
+observe. I asked my neighbour, the _abbe_, what he thought of M. de
+Talleyrand. After looking up in my face distrustfully, he
+whispered:--"Mais, monsieur, c'est un chat qui tombe toujours sur ses
+pieds;" a remark that was literally true tonight, for, the old man was
+kept on his feet longer than could have been agreeable to the owner of
+two such gouty legs.
+
+The Duchesse de Berri, who sat quite near the place where I stood, was
+busy a good deal of the time _a lorgner_ the public through her
+eye-glass. This she did with very little diffidence of manner, and quite
+as coolly as an English duchess would have stared at a late intimate
+whom she was disposed to cut. It certainly was neither a graceful, nor a
+feminine, nor a princely occupation. The Dauphine played the Bourbon
+better; though, when she turned her saddened, not to say _cruel_ eyes,
+on the public, it was with an expression that almost amounted to
+reproach. I did not see her smile once during the whole time she was at
+table; and yet _I_ thought there were many things to smile at.
+
+At length the finger-bowls appeared, and I was not sorry to see them.
+Contrary to what is commonly practised in very great houses, the pages
+placed them on the table, just as Henri puts them before us democrats
+every day. I ought to have said, that the service was made altogether in
+front, or at the unoccupied side of the table, nothing but the bill of
+fare, in the hands of M. de Talleyrand, appearing in the rear. As soon as
+this part of the dinner was over, the king arose, and the whole party
+withdrew by the door on the further side of the galery. In passing the
+_gradins_ of the ladies, he stopped to says a few kind words to an old
+woman who was seated there, muffled in a cloak, and the light of royalty
+vanished.
+
+The catastrophe is to come. The instant the king's back was turned, the
+gallery became a scene of confusion. The musicians ceased playing, and
+began to chatter; the pages dashed about to remove the service, and
+everybody was in motion. Observing that your ---- was standing undecided
+what to do, I walked into the railed area, brushed past the gorgeous
+state table, and gave her my arm. She laughed, and said it had all been
+very magnificent and amusing, but that some one had stolen her shawl! A
+few years before, I had purchased for her a merino shawl, of singular
+fineness, simplicity, and beauty. It was now old, and she had worn it on
+this occasion, because she distrusted the dirt of a palace; and laying
+it carelessly by her side, in the course of the evening she had found in
+its place a very common thing of the same colour. The thief was deceived
+by its appearance your ---- being dressed for an evening party, and had
+probably mistaken it for a cashmere. So much for the company one meets
+at court! Too much importance, however, must not be attached to this
+little _contretems_, as people of condition are apt to procure tickets
+for such places, and to give them to their _femmes de chambre_.
+Probably, half the women present, the "jeunes et jolies" excepted, were
+of this class. But mentioning this affair to the old Princesse de ----,
+she edified me by an account of the manner in which Madame la Comtesse
+de ---- had actually appropriated to the service of her own pretty person
+the _cachemire_ of Madame la Baronne de ----, in the royal presence; and
+how there was a famous quarrel, _a l'outrance_, about it; so I suspend
+my opinions as to the quality of the thief.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER X.
+
+Road to Versailles.--Origin of Versailles.--The present Chateau.--The
+two Trianons.--La Petite Suisse.--Royal Pastime.--Gardens of Versailles.
+--The State Apartments.--Marie Antoinette's Chamber.--Death of Louis XV.
+--Oeil de Boeuf.--The Theatre and Chapel.--A
+Quarry.--Caverns.--Compiegne.--Chateau de Pierre-font.--Influence of
+Monarchy.--Orangery at Versailles.
+
+
+To R. COOPER, ESQ., COOPERSTOWN, NEW YORK.
+
+We have been to Versailles, and although I have no intention to give a
+laboured description of a place about which men have written and talked
+these two centuries, it is impossible to pass over a spot of so much
+celebrity in total silence.
+
+The road to Versailles lies between the park of St. Cloud and the
+village and manufactories of Sevres. A little above the latter is a
+small palace, called Meudon, which, from its great elevation, commands a
+fine view of Paris. The palace of St. Cloud, of course, stands in the
+park; Versailles lies six or eight miles farther west; Compiegne is
+about fifty miles from Paris in one direction; Fontainebleau some thirty
+in another, and Rambouillet rather more remotely, in a third. All these
+palaces, except Versailles, are kept up, and from time to time are
+visited by the court. Versailles was stripped of its furniture in the
+revolution; and even Napoleon, at a time when the French empire extended
+from Hamburgh to Rome, shrunk from the enormous charge of putting it in
+a habitable state. It is computed that the establishment at Versailles,
+first and last, in matters of construction merely, cost the French
+monarchy two hundred millions of dollars! This is almost an incredible
+sum, when we remember the low price of wages in France; but, on the
+other hand, when we consider the vastness of the place, how many natural
+difficulties were overcome, and the multitude of works from the hands of
+artists of the first order it contained, it scarcely seems sufficient.
+
+Versailles originated as a hunting-seat, in the time of Louis XIII. In
+that age, most of the upland near Paris, in this direction, lay in
+forest, royal chases; and, as hunting was truly a princely sport,
+numberless temporary residences of this nature existed in the
+neighbourhood of the capital. There are still many remains of this
+barbarous magnificence, as in the wood of Vincennes, the forest of St.
+Germain, Compiegne, Fontainebleau, and divers others; but great inroads
+have been made in their limits by the progress of civilization and the
+wants of society. So lately as the reign of Louis XV. they hunted quite
+near the town; and we are actually, at this moment, dwelling in a
+country house, at St. Ouen, in which, tradition hatch it, he was wont to
+take his refreshments.
+
+The original building at Versailles was a small chateau, of a very ugly
+formation, and it was built of bricks. I believe it was enlarged, but
+not entirely constructed, by Louis XIII. A portion of this building is
+still visible, having been embraced in the subsequent structures; and,
+judging from its architecture, I should think it must be nearly as
+ancient as the time of Francis I. Around this modest nucleus was
+constructed, by a succession of monarchs, but chiefly by Louis XIV. the
+most regal residence of Europe, in magnificence and extent, if not in
+taste.
+
+The present chateau, besides containing numberless wings and courts, has
+vast _casernes_ for the quarters of the household troops, stables for
+many hundred horses, and is surrounded by a great many separate hotels,
+for the accommodation of the courtiers. It offers a front on the garden,
+in a single continuous line, that is broken only by a projection in the
+centre of more than a third of a mile in length. This is the only
+complete part of the edifice that possesses uniformity; the rest of it
+being huge piles grouped around irregular courts, or thrown forward in
+wings, that correspond to the huge body like those of the ostrich. There
+is on the front next the town, however, some attempt at simplicity and
+intelligibility of plan; for there is a vast open court lined by
+buildings, which have been commenced in the Grecian style. Napoleon, I
+believe, did something here, from which there is reason to suppose that
+he sometimes thought of inhabiting the palace. Indeed, so long as France
+has a king, it is impossible that such a truly royal abode can ever be
+wholly deserted. At present, it is the fashion to grant lodgings in it
+to dependants and favourites. Nothing that I have seen gives me so just
+and so imposing an idea of the old French monarchy as a visit to
+Versailles. Apart from the vastness and splendour of the palace, here is
+a town that actually contained, in former times, a hundred thousand
+souls, that entirely owed its existence to the presence of the court.
+Other monarchs lived in large towns; but here was a monarch whose
+presence created one. Figure to yourself the style of the prince, when a
+place more populous than Baltimore, and infinitely richer in externals,
+existed merely as an appendage to his abode!
+
+The celebrated garden contains two or three hundred acres of land,
+besides the ground that is included in the gardens of the two Trianons.
+These Trianons are small palaces erected in the gardens, as if the
+occupants of the chateau, having reached the acme of magnificence and
+splendour in the principal residence, were seeking refuge against the
+effect of satiety in these humbler abodes. They appear small and
+insignificant after the palace; but the Great Trianon is a considerable
+house, and contains a fine suite of apartments, among which are some
+very good rooms. There are few English abodes of royalty that equal even
+this of Le Grand Trianon. The Petit Trianon was the residence of Madame
+de Maintenon; it afterwards was presented to the unfortunate Marie
+Antoinette, who, in part converted its grounds into an English garden,
+in addition to setting aside a portion into what is called La Petite
+Suisse.
+
+We went through this exceedingly pretty house and its gardens with
+melancholy interest. The first is merely a pavilion in the Italian
+taste, though it is about half as large as the President's House, at
+Washington. I should think the Great Trianon has quite twice the room of
+our own Executive residence; and, as you can well imagine, from what has
+already been said, the Capitol itself would be but a speck among the
+endless edifices of the chateau. The projection in the centre of the
+latter is considerably larger than the capitol, and it materially
+exceeds that building in cubic contents. Now this projection is but a
+small part indeed of the long line of facade, it actually appearing too
+short for the ranges of wings.
+
+Marie Antoinette was much censured for the amusements in which she
+indulged in the grounds of the Little Trianon, and vulgar rumour
+exaggerating their nature, no small portion of her personal unpopularity
+is attributable to this cause. The family of Louis XVI. appears to have
+suffered for the misdeeds of its predecessors, for it not being very
+easy to fancy anything much worse than the immoralities of Louis XV. the
+public were greatly disposed "to visit the sins of the fathers on the
+children."
+
+La Petite Suisse is merely a romantic portion of the garden, in which
+has been built what is called the Swiss Hamlet It contains the miniature
+abodes of the Cure, the Farmer, the Dairywoman, the Garde-de-Chasse, and
+the Seigneur, besides the mill. There is not much that is Swiss,
+however, about the place, with the exception of some resemblance in the
+exterior of the buildings. Here, it is said, the royal family used
+occasionally to meet, and pass an afternoon in a silly representation of
+rural life, that must have proved to be a prodigious caricature. The
+King (at least, so the guide affirmed), performed the part of the
+Seigneur, and occupied the proper abode; the Queen was the Dairy woman,
+and we were shown the marble tables that held her porcelain milk-pans;
+the present King, as became his notorious propensity to field-sports,
+was the Garde-de-Chasse, the late King was the Miller, and, _mirabile
+dictu_, the Archbishop of Paris did not disdain to play the part of the
+Cure. There was, probably, a good deal of poetry in this account; though
+it is pretty certain that the Queen did indulge in some of these
+phantasies. There happened to be with me, the day I visited this spot,
+an American from our own mountains, who had come fresh from home, with
+all his provincial opinions and habits strong about him. As the guide
+explained these matters, I translated them literally into English for
+the benefit of my companion, adding, that the fact rendered the Queen
+extremely unpopular with her subjects. "Unpopular!" exclaimed my country
+neighbour; "why so, sir?" "I cannot say; perhaps they thought it was not
+a fit amusement for a queen." My mountaineer stood a minute cogitating
+the affair in his American mind; and then nodding his head, he said:--"I
+understand it now. The people thought that a king and queen, coming from
+yonder palace to amuse themselves in this toy hamlet, in the characters
+of poor people, _were making game of them_!" I do not know whether this
+inference will amuse you as much as it did me at the time.
+
+Of the gardens and the _jets d'eau_, so renowned, I shall say little.
+The former are in the old French style, formal and stiff, with long
+straight _allees_, but magnificent by their proportions and ornaments.
+The statuary and vases that are exposed to the open air, in this garden,
+must have cost an enormous sum. They are chiefly copies from the
+_antique_.
+
+As you stand on the great terrace, before the centre of the palace, the
+view is down the principal avenue, which terminates at the distance of
+two or three miles with a low naked hill, beyond which appears the void
+of the firmament. This conceit singularly helps the idea of vastness,
+though in effect it is certainly inferior to the pastoral prettiness and
+rural thoughts of modern landscape gardening. Probably too much is
+attempted here; for if the mind cannot conceive of illimitable space,
+still less can it be represented by means of material substances.
+
+We examined the interior of the palace with melancholy pleasure. The
+vast and gorgeous apartments were entirely without furniture, though
+many of the pictures still remain. The painted ceilings, and the
+gildings too, contribute to render the rooms less desolate than they
+would otherwise have been. I shall not stop to describe the saloons of
+Peace and War, and all the other celebrated apartments, that are so
+named from the subjects of their paintings, but merely add that the
+state apartments lie _en suite_, in the main body of the building, and
+that the principal room, or the great gallery, as it is termed, is in
+the centre, with the windows looking up the main avenue of the garden.
+This gallery greatly surpasses in richness and size any other room,
+intended for the ordinary purposes of a palace, that I have ever seen.
+Its length exceeds two hundred and thirty feet, its width is about
+thirty-five, and its height is rather more than forty. The walls are a
+complete succession of marbles, mirrors, and gildings. I believe, the
+windows and doors excepted, that literally no part of the sides or ends
+of this room show any other material. Even some of the doors are loaded
+with these decorations. The ceiling is vaulted, and gorgeous with
+allegories and gildings; they are painted by the best artists of France.
+Here Louis XIV. moved among his courtiers, more like a god than a man,
+and here was exhibited that mixture of grace and moral fraud, of
+elegance and meanness, of hope and disappointment, of pleasure and
+mortification, that form the characters and compose the existence of
+courtiers.
+
+I do not know the precise number of magnificent ante-chambers and saloons
+through which we passed to reach this gallery, but there could not have
+been less than eight; one of which, as a specimen of the scale on which
+the palace is built, is near eighty feet long, and sixty wide. Continuing
+our course along the suite, we passed, among others, a council-room that
+looked more like state than business, and then came to the apartments of
+the Queen. There were several drawing-rooms, and ball-rooms, and
+card-rooms, and ante-rooms, and the change from the gorgeousness of the
+state apartments, to the neat, tasteful, chaste, feminine, white and gold
+of this part of the palace was agreeable, for I had got to be tired of
+splendour, and was beginning to feel a disposition to "make game of the
+people," by descending to rusticity.
+
+The bed-room of Marie Antoinette is in the suite. It is a large chamber,
+in the same style of ornament as the rest of her rooms, and the
+dressing-rooms, bath, and other similar conveniences, were in that
+exquisite French taste, which can only be equalled by imitation. The
+chamber of the King looked upon the court, and was connected with that
+of the Queen, by a winding and intricate communication of some length.
+The door that entered the apartments of the latter opened into a
+dressing-room, and both this door and that which communicated with the
+bed-room form a part of the regular wall, being tapestried as such, so
+as not to be immediately seen,--a style of finish that is quite usual in
+French houses. It was owing to this circumstance that Marie Antoinette
+made her escape, undetected, to the King's chamber, the night the palace
+was entered by the fish-women.
+
+We saw the rooms in which Louis XIV. and Louis XV. died. The latter, you
+may remember, fell a victim to the small-pox, and the disgusting body,
+that had so lately been almost worshipped, was deserted, the moment he
+was dead. It was left for hours, without even the usual decent
+observances. It was on the same occasion, we have been told, that his
+grandchildren, including the heir, were assembled in a private
+drawing-room, waiting the result, when they were startled by a hurried
+trampling of feet. It was the courtiers, rushing in a crowd, to pay
+their homage to the new monarch! All these things forced themselves
+painfully on our minds, as we walked through the state rooms. Indeed
+there are few things that can be more usefully studied, or which awaken
+a greater source of profitable recollections, than a palace that has
+been occupied by a great and historical court. Still they are not
+poetical.
+
+The balcony, in which La Fayette appeared with the Queen and her
+children, opens from one of these rooms. It overlooks the inner court;
+or that in which the carriages of none but the privileged entered, for
+all these things were regulated by arbitrary rules. No one, for
+instance, was permitted to ride in the King's coach, unless his nobility
+dated from a certain century (the fourteenth, I believe), and these were
+your _gentilshommes_; for the word implies more than a noble, meaning an
+ancient nobleman.
+
+The writing cabinet, private dining-room, council-room in ordinary,
+library, etc. of the King, came next; the circuit ending in the Salles
+des Gardes, and the apartments usually occupied by the officers and
+troops on service.
+
+There was one room we got into, I scarce know how. It was a long, high
+gallery, plainly finished for a palace, and it seemed to be lighted from
+an interior court, or well; for one was completely caged when in it.
+This was the celebrated Bull's Eye (_oeil de boeuf_), where the
+courtiers danced attendance before they were received. It got its name
+from an oval window over the principal door.
+
+We looked at no more than the state apartments, and those of the King
+and Queen, and yet we must have gone through some thirty or forty rooms,
+of which, the baths and dressing-room of the Queen excepted, the very
+smallest would be deemed a very large room in America. Perhaps no
+private house contains any as large as the smallest of these rooms, with
+the exception of here and there a hall in a country house; and, no room
+at all, with ceilings nearly as high, and as noble, to say nothing of
+the permanent decorations, of which we have no knowledge whatever, if we
+omit the window-glass, and the mantels, in both of which, size apart, we
+often beat even the French palaces.
+
+We next proceeded to the Salle de Spectacle, which is a huge theatre. It
+may not be as large as the French Opera-house at Paris, but its
+dimensions did not appear to me to be much less. It is true, the stage
+was open, and came into the view; but it is a very large house for
+dramatic representations. Now, neither this building nor the chapel,
+seen on the exterior of the palace, though additions that project from
+the regular line of wall, obtrudes itself on the eye, more than a
+verandah attached to a window, on one of our largest houses! In this
+place the celebrated dinner was given to the officers of the guards.
+
+The chapel is rich and beautiful. No catholic church has pews, or, at
+all events they are very unusual, though the municipalities do sometimes
+occupy them in France, and, of course, the area was vacant. We were most
+struck with the paintings on the ceiling, in which the face of Louis
+XIV. was strangely and mystically blended with that of God the Father!
+Pictorial and carved representations of the Saviour and of the Virgin
+abound in all catholic countries; nor do they much offend, unless when
+the crucifixion is represented with bleeding wounds; for, as both are
+known to have appeared in the human form, the mind is not shocked at
+seeing them in the semblance of humanity. But this was the first attempt
+to delineate the Deity we had yet seen; and it caused us all to shudder.
+He is represented in the person of an old man looking from the clouds,
+in the centre of the ceiling, and the King appears among the angels that
+surround him. Flattery could not go much farther, without encroaching on
+omnipotence itself.
+
+In returning from Versailles, to a tithe of the magnificence of which I
+have not alluded, I observed carts coming out of the side of a hill,
+loaded with the whitish stone that composes the building material of
+Paris. We stopped the carriage, and went into the passage, where we
+found extensive excavations. A lane of fifteen or twenty feet was cut
+through the stone, and the material was carted away in heavy square
+blocks. Piers were left, at short intervals, to sustain the
+superincumbent earth; and, in the end, the place gets to be a succession
+of intricate passages, separated by these piers, which resemble so many
+small masses of houses among the streets of a town. The entire region
+around Paris lies on a substratum of this stone, which indurates by
+exposure to the air, and the whole secret of the celebrated catacombs of
+Paris is just the same as that of this quarry, with the difference that
+this opens on a level with the upper world, lying in a hill, while one
+is compelled to descend to get to the level of the others. But enormous
+wheels, scattered about the fields in the vicinity of the town, show
+where shafts descend to new quarries on the plains, which are precisely
+the same as those under Paris. The history of these subterranean
+passages is very simple. The stone beneath has been transferred to the
+surface, as a building material; and the graves of the town, after
+centuries, were emptied into the vaults below. Any apprehensions of the
+caverns falling in, on a great scale, are absurd, as the constant
+recurrence of the piers, which are the living rock, must prevent such a
+calamity; though it is within the limits of possibility that a house or
+two might disappear. Quite lately, it is said, a tree in the garden of
+the Luxembourg fell through, owing to the water working a passage down
+into the quarries, by following its roots. The top of the tree remained
+above ground some distance; and to prevent unnecessary panic, the police
+immediately caused the place to be concealed by a high and close board
+fence. The tree was cut away in the night, the hole was filled up, and
+few knew anything about it. But it is scarcely possible that any serious
+accident should occur, even to a single house, without a previous and
+gradual sinking of its walls giving notice of the event. The palace of
+the Luxembourg, one of the largest and finest edifices of Paris, stands
+quite near the spot where the tree fell through, and yet there is not
+the smallest danger of the structure's disappearing some dark night, the
+piers below always affording sufficient support. _Au reste_, the
+catacombs lie under no other part of Paris than the Quartier St.
+Jacques, not crossing the river, nor reaching even the Faubourg St.
+Germain.
+
+I have taken you so unceremoniously out of the chateau of Versailles to
+put you into the catacombs, that some of the royal residences have not
+received the attention I intended. We have visited Compiegne this
+summer, including it in a little excursion of about a hundred miles,
+that we made in the vicinity of the capital, though it scarcely offered
+sufficient matter of interest to be the subject of an especial letter.
+We found the forest deserving of its name, and some parts of it almost
+as fine as an old American wood of the second class. We rode through it
+five or six miles to see a celebrated ruin, called Pierre-fond, which
+was one of those baronial holds, out of which noble robbers used to
+issue, to plunder on the highway, and commit all sorts of acts of
+genteel violence. The castle and the adjacent territory formed one of
+the most ancient seigneuries of France. The place was often besieged and
+taken. In the time of Henry IV. that monarch, finding the castle had
+fallen into the hands of a set of desperadoes, who were ranked with the
+Leaguers, sent the Duc d'Epernon against the place; but he was wounded,
+and obliged to raise the siege. Marshal Biron was next despatched, with
+all the heavy artillery that could be spared; but he met with little
+better success. This roused Henry, who finally succeeded in getting
+possession of the place. In the reign of his son, Louis XIII, the
+robberies and excesses of those who occupied the castle became so
+intolerable, that the government seized it again, and ordered it to be
+destroyed. Now you will remember that this castle stood in the very
+heart of France, within fifty miles of the capital, and but two leagues
+from a royal residence, and all so lately as the year 1617; and that it
+was found necessary to destroy it, on account of the irregularities of
+its owners. What an opinion one is driven to form of the moral
+civilization of Europe from a fact like this! Feudal grandeur loses
+greatly in a comparison with modern law, and more humble honesty.
+
+It was easier, however, to order the Chateau de Pierre-fond to be
+destroyed, than to effect that desirable object. Little more was
+achieved than to make cuts into the external parts of the towers and
+walls, and to unroof the different buildings; and, although this was
+done two hundred years since, time has made little impression on the
+ruins. We were shown a place where there had been an attempt to break
+into the walls for stones, but which had been abandoned, because it was
+found easier to quarry them from the living rock. The principal towers
+were more than a hundred feet high, and their angles and ornaments
+seemed to be as sharp and solid as ever. This was much the noblest
+French ruin we had seen, and it may be questioned if there are many
+finer, out of Italy, in Europe.
+
+The palace of Compiegne, after that of Versailles, hardly rewarded us
+for the trouble of examining it. Still it is large and in perfect
+repair: but the apartments are common-place, though there are a few that
+are good. A prince, however, is as well lodged, even here, as is usual
+in the north of Europe. The present king is fond of resorting to this
+house, on account of the game of the neighbouring forest. We saw several
+roebucks bounding among the trees, in our drive to Pierre-fond.[13]
+
+[Footnote 13: Pierre-fond, or Pierre-font]
+
+I have dwelt on the palaces and the court so much, because one cannot
+get a correct idea of what France was, and perhaps I ought to say, of
+what France, through the reaction, _will_ be, if this point were
+overlooked. The monarch was all in all in the nation--the centre of
+light, wealth, and honour; letters, the arts, and the sciences revolved
+around him, as the planets revolve around the sun; and if there ever was
+a civilized people whose example it would be fair to quote for or
+against the effects of monarchy, I think it would be the people of
+France. I was surprised at my own ignorance on the subject of the
+magnificence of these kings, of which, indeed, it is not easy for an
+untravelled American to form any just notion; and it has struck me you
+might be glad to hear a little on these points.
+
+After all I have said, I find I have entirely omitted the Orangery at
+Versailles. But then I have said little or nothing of the canals, the
+_jets d'eau_, of the great and little parks, which, united, are fifty
+miles in circumference, and of a hundred other things. Still, as this
+orangery is on a truly royal scale, it deserves a word of notice before
+I close my letter. The trees are housed in winter in long vaulted
+galleries, beneath the great terrace; and there is a sort of sub-court
+in front of them, where they are put into the sun during the pleasant
+season. This place is really an orange grove; and, although every tree
+is in a box, and is nursed like a child, many of them are as large as it
+is usual to find in the orange groves of low latitudes. Several are very
+old, two or three dating from the fifteenth century, and one from the
+early part of it. What notions do you get of the magnificence of the
+place, when you are told, that a palace, subterraneous, it is true, is
+devoted to this single luxury, and that acres are covered with trees in
+boxes?
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XI.
+
+Laws of Intercourse.--Americans in Europe.--Americans and English.
+--Visiting in America.--Etiquette of Visits.--Presentations at Foreign
+Courts.--Royal Receptions.--American Pride.--Pay of the President.
+--American Diplomatist.
+
+
+To JAMES STEVENSON, ESQUIRE, ALBANY.
+
+I intend this letter to be useful rather than entertaining. Living, as we
+Americans do, remote from the rest of the world, and possessing so many
+practices peculiar to ourselves, at the same time that we are altogether
+wanting in usages that are familiar to most other nations, it should not
+be matter of surprise that we commit some mistakes on this side of the
+water, in matters of taste and etiquette. A few words simply expressed,
+and a few explanations plainly made, may serve to remove some errors, and
+perhaps render your own contemplated visit to this part of the world more
+agreeable.
+
+There is no essential difference in the leading rules of ordinary
+intercourse among the polished of all Christian nations. Though some of
+these rules may appear arbitrary, it will be found, on examination, that
+they are usually derived from very rational and sufficient motives. They
+may vary, in immaterial points, but even these variations arise from
+some valid circumstance.
+
+The American towns are growing so rapidly, that they are getting to have
+the population of capitals without enjoying their commonest facilities.
+The exaggerated tone of our largest towns, for instance, forbids the
+exchange of visits by means of servants. It may suit the habits of
+provincial life to laugh at this as an absurdity, but it may be taken
+pretty safely as a rule, that men and women of as much common sense as
+the rest of their fellow-creatures, with the best opportunities of
+cultivating all those tastes that are dependant on society, and with no
+other possible motive than convenience, would not resort to such a
+practice without a suitable inducement. No one who has not lived in a
+large town that _does_ possess these facilities, can justly appreciate
+their great advantages, or properly understand how much a place like New
+York, with its three hundred thousand inhabitants, loses by not adopting
+them. We have conventions for all sorts of things in America, some of
+which do good and others harm, but I cannot imagine anything that would
+contribute more to the comfort of society, than one which should settle
+the laws of intercourse on principles better suited to the real
+condition of the country than those which now exist. It is not unusual
+to read descriptions deriding the forms of Europe, written by travelling
+Americans; but I must think they have been the productions of very young
+travellers, or, at least, of such as have not had the proper means of
+appreciating the usages they ridicule Taking my own experience as a
+guide, I have no hesitation in saying, that I know no people among whom
+the ordinary social intercourse is as uncomfortable, and as little
+likely to stand the test of a rational examination, as our own.
+
+The first rule, all-important for an American to know, is, that the
+latest arrival makes the first visit. England is, in some respects, an
+exception to this practice, but I believe it prevails in all the rest of
+Europe. I do not mean to say that departures are not made from this law,
+in particular instances; but they should always be taken as exceptions,
+and as pointed compliments. This rule has many conveniences, and I think
+it also shows a more delicate attention to sentiment and feeling. While
+the points of intrusion and of disagreeable acquaintances are left just
+where they would be under our own rule, the stranger is made the judge
+of his own wishes. It is, moreover, impossible, in a large town, to know
+of every arrival. Many Americans, who come to Europe with every claim to
+attention, pass through it nearly unnoticed, from a hesitation about
+obtruding themselves on others, under the influence of the opinions in
+which they have been educated. This for a long time was my own case, and
+it was only when a more familiar acquaintance with the practices of this
+part of the world made me acquainted with their advantages that I could
+consent freely to put myself forward.
+
+You are not to understand that any stranger arriving in a place like
+Paris, or London, has a right to leave cards for whom he pleases. It is
+not the custom, except for those who, by birth, or official station, or
+a high reputation, may fairly deem themselves privileged, to assume this
+liberty, and even then, it is always better to take some preliminary
+step to assure one's self that the visit will be acceptable. The law of
+salutes is very much the law of visits, in this part of the world. The
+ship arriving sends an officer to know if his salute will be returned
+gun for gun, and the whole affair, it is true, is conducted in rather a
+categorical manner, but the governing principles are the same in both
+cases, though more management may be required between two gentlemen than
+between two men-of-war.
+
+The Americans in Europe, on account of the country's having abjured all
+the old feudal distinctions that still so generally prevail here, labour
+under certain disadvantages, that require, on the one hand, much tact
+and discretion to overcome, and, on the other, occasionally much
+firmness and decision.
+
+The rule I have adopted in my own case, is to defer to every usage, in
+matters of etiquette, so far as I have understood them, that belongs to
+the country in which I may happen to be. If, as has sometimes happened
+(but not in a solitary instance in France), the claims of a stranger
+have been overlooked, I have satisfied myself by remembering, that, in
+this respect at least, the Americans are the superiors, for that is a
+point in which we seldom fail; and if they are remembered, to accept of
+just as much attention as shall be offered. In cases, in which those
+arbitrary distinctions are set up, that, by the nature of our
+institutions cannot, either in similar or in any parallel cases, exist
+in America, and the party making the pretension is on neutral ground,
+_if the claim be in any manner pressed_, I would say that it became an
+American to resist it promptly; neither to go out of his way to meet it,
+nor to defer to it when it crosses his path. In really good society
+awkward cases of this nature are not very likely to occur; they are,
+however, more likely to occur as between our own people and the English,
+than between those of any other nation; for the latter, in mixed general
+associations, have scarcely yet learned to look upon and treat us as the
+possessors of an independent country. It requires perfect
+self-possession, great tact, and some nerve, for an American, who is
+brought much in contact with the English on the continent of Europe, to
+avoid a querulous and ungentlemanlike disposition to raise objections on
+these points, and at the same time to maintain the position, and command
+the respect, with which he should never consent to dispense. From my own
+little experience, I should say we are better treated, and have less to
+overlook, in our intercourse with the higher than with the intermediate
+classes of the English.
+
+You will have very different accounts of these points, from some of our
+travellers. I only give you the results of my own observation, under the
+necessary limitations of my own opportunities. Still I must be permitted
+to say that too many of our people, in their habitual deference to
+England, mistake offensive condescension for civility. Of the two, I
+will confess I would rather encounter direct arrogance, than the
+assumption of a right to be affable. The first may at least be resisted.
+Of all sorts of superiority, that of a condescending quality is the
+least palatable.
+
+I believe Washington is the only place in America where it is permitted
+to send cards. In every other town, unless accompanied by an invitation,
+and even then the card is supposed to be left, it would be viewed as
+airs. It is even equivocal to leave a card in person, unless denied.
+Nothing can be worse adapted to the wants of American society than this
+rigid conformity to facts. Without porters; with dwellings in which the
+kitchens and servants' halls are placed just as far from the
+street-doors as dimensions of the houses will allow; with large
+straggling towns that cover as much ground as the more populous capitals
+of Europe, and these towns not properly divided into quarters; with a
+society as ambitious of effect, in its way, as any I know; and with
+people more than usually occupied with business and the family
+cares,--one is expected to comply rigidly with the most formal rules of
+village propriety. It is easy to trace these usages to their source,
+provincial habits and rustic manners; but towns with three hundred
+thousand inhabitants ought to be free from both. Such rigid conditions
+cannot well be observed, and a consequence already to be traced is, that
+those forms of society which tend to refine it, and to render it more
+human and graceful, are neglected from sheer necessity. Carelessness in
+the points of association connected with sentiment (and all personal
+civilities and attention have this root) grows upon one like
+carelessness in dress, until an entire community may get to be as
+ungracious in deportment, as it is unattractive in attire.
+
+The etiquette of visits, here, is reduced to a sort of science. A card
+is sent by a servant, and returned by a servant. It is polite to return
+it, next day, though three, I believe, is the lawful limits, and it is
+politer still to return it the day it is received. There is no
+affectation about sending the card, as it is not at all unusual to put
+E.P. _(en personne)_ on it, by way of expressing a greater degree of
+attention, even when the card is sent. When the call is really made in
+person, though the visitor does not ask to be admitted, it is also
+common to request the porter to say that the party was at the gate. All
+these niceties may seem absurd and supererogatory, but depend on it they
+have a direct and powerful agency in refining and polishing intercourse,
+just as begging a man's pardon, when you tread on his toe, has an effect
+to humanize, though the parties know no offence was intended.
+Circumstances once rendered it proper that I should leave a card for a
+Russian _diplomate_, an act that I took care he should know, indirectly,
+I went out of my way to do, as an acknowledgment for the civilities his
+countrymen showed to us Americans. My name was left at the gate of his
+hotel (it was not in Paris), as I was taking a morning ride. On
+returning home, after an absence of an hour, I found his card lying on
+my table. Instead, however, of its containing the usual official titles,
+it was simply Prince --. I was profoundly emerged in the study of this
+new feature in the forms of etiquette, when the friend, who had prepared
+the way for the visit, entered. I asked an explanation, and he told me
+that I had received a higher compliment than could be conveyed by a
+merely official card, this being a proffer of _personal_ attention. "You
+will get an invitation to dinner soon;" and, sure enough, one came
+before he had quitted the house. Now, here was a delicate and flattering
+attention paid, and one that I felt, without trouble to either party;
+one that the occupations of the _diplomate_ would scarcely permit him to
+pay, except in extraordinary cases, under rules more rigid.
+
+There is no obligation on a stranger to make the first visit, certainly;
+but if he do not, he is not to be surprised if no one notices him. It is
+a matter of delicacy to obtrude on the privacy of such a person, it
+being presumed that he wishes to be retired. We have passed some time in
+a village near Paris, which contains six or eight visitable families.
+With one of these I had some acquaintance, and we exchanged civilities;
+but wishing to be undisturbed, I extended my visit no farther, and I
+never saw anything of the rest of my neighbours. They waited for me to
+make the advances.
+
+A person in society, here, who is desirous of relieving himself, for a
+time, from the labour and care of maintaining the necessary intercourse,
+can easily do it, by leaving cards of P.P.O. It might be awkward to
+remain long in a place very publicly after such a step, but I ventured
+on it once, to extricate myself from engagements that interfered with
+more important pursuits, with entire success. I met several
+acquaintances in the street, after the cards were sent, and we even
+talked together, but I got no more visits or invitations. When ready _to
+return to town_, all I had to do was to leave cards again, and things
+went on as if nothing had happened. I parried one or two allusions to my
+absence, and had no further difficulty. The only awkward part of it was,
+that I accepted an invitation to dine _en famille_ with a literary
+friend, and one of the guests, of whom there were but three, happened to
+be a person whose invitation to dinner I had declined on account of
+quitting town! As he was a sensible man, I told him the simple fact, and
+we laughed at the _contretems_, and drank oar wine in peace.
+
+The Americans who come abroad frequently complain of a want of
+hospitality in the public agents. There is a strong disposition in every
+man under institutions like our own, to mistake himself for a part of
+the government, in matters with which he has no proper connexion, while
+too many totally overlook those interests which it is their duty to
+watch. In the first place, the people of the United Slates do not give
+salaries to their ministers of sufficient amount to authorize them to
+expect that any part of the money should be returned in the way of
+personal civilities. Fifty thousand francs a year is the usual sum named
+by the French, as the money necessary to maintain a genteel town
+establishment, with moderate evening entertainments, and an occasional
+dinner. This is three thousand francs more than the salary of the
+minister, out of which he is moreover expected to maintain his regular
+diplomatic intercourse. It is impossible for any one to do much in the
+way of personal civilities, on such an allowance.
+
+There is, moreover, on the part of too many of our people, an aptitude
+to betray a jealous sensitiveness on the subject of being presented at
+foreign courts. I have known some claim it _as a right_ when it is
+yielded to the minister himself as an act of grace. The receptions of a
+sovereign are merely his particular mode of receiving visits. No one
+will pretend that the President of the United States is obliged to give
+levees and dinners, nor is a king any more compelled to receive
+strangers, or even his own subjects, unless it suit his policy and his
+taste. His palace is his house, and he is the master of it, the same as
+any other man is master of his own abode. It is true, the public expects
+something of him, and his allowance is probably regulated by this
+expectation, but the interference does not go so far as to point out his
+company. Some kings pass years without holding a court at all; others
+receive every week. The public obligation to open his door, is no more
+than an obligation of expediency, of which he, and he only, can be the
+judge. This being the rule, not only propriety, but fair dealing
+requires that all who frequent a court should comply with the conditions
+that are understood to be implied in the permission. While there exists
+an exaggerated opinion, on the part of some of our people, on the
+subject of the fastidiousness of princes, as respects their associates,
+there exists among others very confused notions on the other side of the
+question. A monarch usually cares very little about the quarterings and
+the nobility of the person he receives, but he always wishes his court
+to be frequented by people of education, accomplishments, and breeding.
+In Europe these qualities are confined to _castes_, and, beyond a
+question, as a general practice, every king would not only prefer, but,
+were there a necessity for it, he would command that his doors should be
+closed against all others, unless they came in a character different
+from that of courtiers. This object has, in effect, been obtained, by
+establishing a rule, that no one who has not been presented at his own
+court can claim to be presented at any foreign European court; thus
+leaving each sovereign to see that no one of his own subjects shall
+travel with this privilege who would be likely to prove an unpleasant
+guest to any other prince. But we have neither any prince nor any court,
+and the minister is left to decide for himself who is, and who is not,
+proper to be presented.
+
+Let us suppose a case. A master and his servant make a simultaneous
+request to be presented to the King of France. Both are American
+citizens, and if _either_ has any political claim, beyond mere courtesy,
+to have his request attended to, _both_ have. The minister is left to
+decide for himself. He cannot so far abuse the courtesy that permits him
+to present his countrymen at all, as to present the domestic, and of
+course he declines doing it. In this case, perhaps, public opinion would
+sustain him, as, unluckily, the party of the domestics is small in
+America, the duties usually falling to the share of foreigners and
+blacks. But the principle may be carried upwards, until a point is
+attained where a minister might find it difficult to decide between that
+which his own sense of propriety should dictate, and that which others
+might be disposed to claim. All other ministers get rid of their
+responsibility by the acts of their own courts; but the minister of the
+republic is left exposed to the calumny, abuse, and misrepresentation of
+any disappointed individual, should he determine to do what is strictly
+right.
+
+Under these circumstances, it appears to me that there are but two
+courses left for any agent of our government to pursue: either to take
+_official_ rank as his only guide, or to decline presenting any one. It
+is not his duty to act as a master of ceremonies; every court has a
+regular officer for this purpose, and any one who has been presented
+himself, is permitted on proper representations to present others. The
+trifling disadvantage will be amply compensated for, by the great and
+peculiar benefits that arise from our peculiar form of government.
+
+These things will quite likely strike you as of little moment. They are,
+however, of more concern than one living in the simple society of
+America may at first suppose. The etiquette of visiting has of course an
+influence on the entire associations of a traveller, and may not be
+overlooked, while the single fact that one people were practically
+excluded from the European courts, would have the same effect on their
+other enjoyments here, that it has to exclude an individual from the
+most select circles of any particular town. Ordinary life is altogether
+coloured by things that, in themselves, may appear trifling, but which
+can no more be neglected with impunity, than one can neglect the varying
+fashions in dress.
+
+The Americans are not a shoving people, like their cousins the English.
+Their fault in this particular lies in a morbid pride, with a
+stubbornness that is the result of a limited experience, and which is
+too apt to induce them to set up their own provincial notions, as the
+standard, and to throw them backward into the intrenchments, of
+self-esteem. This feeling is peculiarly fostered by the institutions. It
+is easy to err in this manner; and it is precisely the failing of the
+countryman, everywhere, when he first visits town. It is, in fact, the
+fault of ignorance of the world. By referring to what I have just told
+you, it will be seen that these are the very propensities which will be
+the most likely to make one uncomfortable in Europe, where so much of
+the initiative of intercourse is thrown upon the shoulders of the
+stranger.
+
+I cannot conclude this letter without touching on another point, that
+suggests itself at the moment. It is the fashion to decry the
+niggardliness of the American government on the subject of money, as
+compared with those of this hemisphere. Nothing can be more unjust. Our
+working men are paid better than even those of England, with the
+exception of a few who have high dignities to support. I do not see the
+least necessity for giving the President a dollar more than he gets
+to-day, since all he wants is enough to entertain handsomely, and to
+shield him from loss. Under our system, we never can have an _exclusive_
+court, nor is it desirable, for in this age a court is neither a school
+of manners, nor a school of anything else that is estimable. These facts
+are sufficiently proved by England, a country whose mental cultivation
+and manners never stood as high as they do to-day, and yet it has
+virtually been without a court for an entire generation. A court may
+certainly foster taste and elegance; but they may be quite as well
+fostered by other, and less exclusive, means. But while the President
+may receive enough, the heads of departments, at home, and the foreign
+ministers of the country, are not more than half paid, _particularly the
+latter_. The present minister is childless, his establishment and his
+manner of living are both handsome, but not a bit more so than those of
+a thousand others who inhabit this vast capital, and his intercourse
+with his colleagues is not greater than is necessary to the interests of
+his country. Now, I know from his own statement, that his expenses,
+without a family, exceed by one hundred per cent, his salary. With a
+personal income of eighty to a hundred thousand francs a years, he can
+bear this drain on his private fortune, but he is almost the only
+minister we ever had here who could.
+
+The actual position of our diplomatic agents in Europe is little
+understood at home. There are but two or three modes of maintaining the
+rights of a nation, to say nothing of procuring those concessions from
+others which enter into the commercial relations of states, and in some
+degree affect their interests. The best method, certainly, as respects
+the two first, is to manifest a determination to defend them by an
+appeal to force; but so many conflicting interests stand in the way of
+such a policy, that it is exceedingly difficult, wisest and safest in
+the end though it be, to carry it out properly. At any rate, such a
+course has never yet been in the power of the American government,
+whatever it may be able to do hereafter, with its increasing numbers and
+growing wealth. But even strength is not always sufficient to obtain
+voluntary and friendly concessions, for principle must, in some degree,
+be respected by the most potent people, or they will be put to the ban
+of the world. Long diplomatic letters, although they may answer the
+purposes of ministerial _exposes_, and read well enough in the columns
+of a journal, do very little, in fact, as make-weights in negotiations.
+I have been told here, _sub rosa_, and I believe it that some of our
+laboured efforts, in this way to obtain redress in the protracted
+negotiation for indemnity, have actually lain months in the _bureaux_,
+unread by those who alone have power to settle the question. Some
+_commis_ perhaps may have cursorily related their contents to his
+superior, but the superior himself is usually too much occupied in
+procuring and maintaining ministerial majorities, or in looking after
+the monopolizing concerns of European politics, to wade through folios
+of elaborate argument in manuscript. The public ought to understand,
+that the point presents itself to him in the security of his master's
+capital, and with little or no apprehension of its coming to an appeal
+to arms, very differently from what it occasionally presents itself in
+the pages of a President's message, or in a debate in Congress. He has
+so many demands on his time, that it is even difficult to have a working
+interview with him at all; and when one is obtained, it is not usual to
+do more than to go over the preliminaries. The details are necessarily
+referred to subordinates.
+
+Now, in such a state of things, any one accustomed to the world, can
+readily understand how much may be effected by the kind feelings that
+are engendered by daily, social intercourse. A few words can be
+whispered in the ears of a minister, in the corner of a drawing-room,
+that would never reach him in his bureau. Then _all_ the ministers are
+met in society, while the _diplomate_, properly speaking, can claim
+officially to see but _one_. In short, in saving, out of an overflowing
+treasury, a few thousand dollars a year, we trifle with our own
+interests, frequently embarrass our agents, and in some degree discredit
+the country. I am not one of your _sensitives_ on the subject of parade
+and appearance, nor a member of the embroidery school; still I would
+substitute for the irrational frippery of the European customs, a
+liberal hospitality, and a real elegance, that should speak well for the
+hearts and tastes of the nation. The salary of the minister at Paris, I
+know it, by the experience of a housekeeper, ought to be increased by at
+least one half, and it would tell better for the interests of the
+country were it doubled. Even in this case, however, I do not conceive
+that an American would be justified in mistaking the house of an envoy
+for a national inn; but that the proper light to view his allowances
+would be to consider them as made, first, as an act of justice to the
+functionary himself; next, as a measure of expediency, as connected with
+the important interests of the country. As it is, I am certain that no
+one but a man of fortune can accept a foreign appointment, without
+committing injustice to his heirs; and I believe few do accept them
+without sincerely regretting the step, in after years.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XII.
+
+Sir Walter Scott in Paris.--Conversation with him.--Copyright in
+America.--Miss Scott.--French Compliments.--Sir Walter Scott's Person
+and Manners.--Ignorance as to America.--French Commerce.--French
+Translations.--American Luxury.
+
+
+To JAMES E. DE KAY, ESQUIRE.
+
+We have not only had Mr. Canning in Paris, but Sir Walter Scott has
+suddenly appeared among us. The arrival of the Great Unknown, or,
+indeed, of any little Unknown from England, would be an event to throw
+all the reading clubs at home into a state of high moral and poetical
+excitement. We are true village _lionizers_. As the professors of the
+Catholic religion are notoriously more addicted to yielding faith to
+miraculous interventions, in the remoter dioceses, than in Rome itself;
+as loyalty is always more zealous in a colony than in a court; as
+fashions are more exaggerated in a province than in a capital, and men
+are more prodigious to every one else than their own valets,--so do we
+throw the haloes of a vast ocean around the honoured heads of the
+celebrated men of this eastern hemisphere. This, perhaps, is the natural
+course of things, and is as unavoidable as that the sun shall hold the
+earth within the influence of its attraction, until matters shall be
+reversed by the earth's becoming the larger and more glorious orb of the
+two. Not so in Paris. Here men of every gradation of celebrity, from
+Napoleon down to the Psalmanazar of the day, are so very common, that
+one scarcely turns round in the streets to look at them. Delicate and
+polite attentions, however, fall as much to the share of reputation here
+as in any other country, and perhaps more so as respects literary men,
+though there is so little _wonder-mongering_. It would be quite
+impossible that the presence of Sir Walter Scott should not excite a
+sensation. He was frequently named in the journals, received a good deal
+of private and some public notice, but, on the whole, much less of both,
+I think, than one would have a right to expect for him, in a place like
+Paris. I account for the fact, by the French distrusting the forthcoming
+work on Napoleon, and by a little dissatisfaction which prevails on the
+subject of the tone of "Paul's Letters to his Kinsfolk." This feeling
+may surprise you, as coming from a nation as old and as great as France;
+but, alas! we are all human.
+
+The King spoke to him, in going to his chapel, Sir Walter being in
+waiting for that purpose; but, beyond this, I believe he met with no
+civilities from the court.
+
+As for myself, circumstances that it is needless to recount had brought
+me, to a slight degree, within the notice of Sir Walter Scott, though we
+had never met, nor had I ever seen him, even in public, so as to know
+his person. Still I was not without hopes of being more fortunate now,
+while I felt a delicacy about obtruding myself any further on his time
+and attention. Several days after his arrival went by, however, without
+my good luck bringing me in his way, and I began to give the matter up,
+though the Princesse ---- with whom I had the advantage of being on
+friendly terms, flattered me with an opportunity of seeing the great
+writer at her house, for she had a fixed resolution of making his
+acquaintance before he left Paris, _coute que coute_.
+
+It might have been ten days after the arrival of Sir Walter Scott, that
+I had ordered a carriage, one morning, with an intention of driving over
+to the other side of the river, and had got as far as the lower flight
+of steps, on my way to enter it, when, by the tramping of horses in the
+court, I found that another coach was driving in. It was raining, and,
+as my own carriage drove from the door to make way for the newcomer, I
+stopped where I was, until it could return. The carriage-steps rattled,
+and presently a large, heavy-moulded man appeared in the door of the
+hotel. He was grey, and limped a little, walking with a cane. His
+carriage immediately drove round, and was succeeded by mine, again; so I
+descended. We passed each other on the stairs, bowing as a matter of
+course. I had got to the door, and was about to enter the carriage, when
+it flashed on my mind that the visit might be to myself. The two lower
+floors of the hotel were occupied as a girl's boarding-school; the
+reason of our dwelling in it, for our own daughters were in the
+establishment; _au second_, there was nothing but our own _appartement_,
+and above us, again, dwelt a family whose visitors never came in
+carriages. The door of the boarding-school was below, and men seldom
+came to it, at all. Strangers, moreover, sometimes did honour me with
+calls. Under these impressions I paused, to see if the visitor went as
+far as our flight of steps. All this time, I had not the slightest
+suspicion of who he was, though I fancied both the face and form were
+known to me.
+
+The stranger got up the large stone steps slowly, leaning, with one
+hand, on the iron railing, and with the other, on his cane. He was on
+the first landing, as I stopped, and, turning towards the next flight,
+our eyes met. The idea that I might be the person he wanted, seemed then
+to strike him for the first time. "Est-ce Mons. ---- que j'ai l'honneur
+de voir?" he asked, in French, and with but an indifferent accent.
+"Monsieur, je m'appelle ----. Eh bien, donc--je suis Walter Scott."
+
+I ran up to the landing, shook him by the hand, which he stood holding
+out to me cordially, and expressed my sense of the honour he was
+conferring. He told me, in substance, that the Princesse ---- had been
+as good as her word, and having succeeded herself in getting hold of
+him, she had good-naturedly given him my address. By way of cutting
+short all ceremony, he had driven from his hotel to my lodgings. All
+this time he was speaking French, while my answers and remarks were in
+English. Suddenly recollecting himself, he said--"Well, here have I been
+_parlez-vousing_ to you, in a way to surprise you, no doubt; but these
+Frenchmen have got my tongue so set to their lingo, that I have half
+forgotten my own language." As we proceeded up the next flight of steps,
+he accepted my arm, and continued the conversation in English, walking
+with more difficulty than I had expected to see. You will excuse the
+vanity of my repeating the next observation he made, which I do in the
+hope that some of our own exquisites in literature may learn in what
+manner a man of true sentiment and sound feeling regards a trait that
+they have seen fit to stigmatize unbecoming, "I'll tell you what I most
+like," he added, abruptly; "and it is the manner in which you maintain
+the ascendency of your own country on all proper occasions, without
+descending to vulgar abuse of ours. You are obliged to bring the two
+nations in collision, and I respect your liberal hostility." This will
+probably be esteemed treason in our own self-constituted mentors of the
+press, one of whom, I observe, has quite lately had to apologize to his
+readers for exposing some of the sins of the English writers in
+reference to ourselves! But these people are not worth our attention,
+for they have neither the independence which belongs to masculine
+reason, nor manhood even to prize the quality in others. "I am afraid
+the mother has not always treated the daughter well," he continued,
+"feeling a little jealous of her growth, perhaps; for, though we hope
+England has not yet begun to descend on the evil side, we have a
+presentiment that she has got to the top of the ladder."
+
+There were two entrances to our apartments; one, the principal, leading
+by an ante-chamber and _salle a manger_ into the _salon_, and thence
+through other rooms to a terrace; and the other, by a private corridor,
+to the same spot. The door of my cabinet opened on this corridor, and
+though it was dark, crooked, and anything but savoury, as it led by the
+kitchen, I conducted Sir Walter through it, under an impression that he
+walked with pain; an idea of which I could not divest myself, in the
+hurry of the moment. But for this awkwardness on my part, I believe I
+should have been the witness of a singular interview. General Lafayette
+had been with me a few minutes before, and he had gone away by the
+_salon_, in order to speak to Mrs. ----. Having a note to write, I had
+left him there, and I think his carriage could not have quitted the
+court when that of Sir Walter Scott entered. If so, the General must
+have passed out by the ante-chamber about the time we came through the
+corridor.
+
+There would be an impropriety in my relating all that passed in this
+interview; but we talked over a matter of business, and then the
+conversation was more general. You will remember that Sir Walter was
+still the _Unknown_[14] and that he was believed to be in Paris in search
+of facts for the Life of Napoleon. Notwithstanding the former
+circumstance, he spoke of his works with great frankness and simplicity,
+and without the parade of asking any promises of secrecy. In short, as
+he commenced in this style, his authorship was alluded to by us both
+just as if it had never been called in question. He asked me if I had a
+copy of the ---- by me, and on my confessing I did not own a single
+volume of anything I had written, he laughed, and said he believed that
+most authors had the same feeling on the subject: as for himself, he
+cared not if he never saw a Waverley novel again, as long as he lived.
+Curious to know whether a writer as great and as practised as he felt
+the occasional despondency which invariably attends all my own little
+efforts of this nature, I remarked that I found the mere composition of
+a tale a source of pleasure, so much so, that I always invented twice as
+much as was committed to paper in my walks, or in bed, and in my own
+judgment much the best parts of the composition never saw the light; for
+what was written was usually written at set hours, and was a good deal a
+matter of chance, and that going over and over the same subject in
+proofs disgusted me so thoroughly with the book, that I supposed every
+one else would be disposed to view it with the same eyes. To this he
+answered that he was spared much of the labour of proofreading,
+Scotland, he presumed, being better off than America in this respect;
+but still be said he "would as soon see his dinner again after a hearty
+meal as to read one of his own tales when he was fairly rid of it."
+
+[Footnote 14: He did not avow himself for several months afterwards.]
+
+He sat with me nearly an hour, and he manifested, during the time the
+conversation was not tied down to business, a strong propensity to
+humour. Having occasion to mention our common publisher in Paris, he
+quaintly termed him, with a sort of malicious fun, "our Gosling;"[15]
+adding, that he hoped he, at least, "laid golden eggs."
+
+[Footnote 15: His name was Gosselin.]
+
+I hoped that he had found the facilities he desired, in obtaining facts
+for the forthcoming history. He rather hesitated about admitting this.
+"One can hear as much as he pleases, as a gentleman, he is not always
+sure how much of it he can, with propriety, relate in a book;
+besides"--throwing all his latent humour into the expression of his
+small grey eyes--"one may even doubt how much of what he hears is fit
+for history on another account." He paused, and his face assumed an
+exquisite air of confiding simplicity, as he continued, with perfect
+_bonne foi_ and strong Scottish feeling, "I have been to see _my
+countryman_ M'Donald, and I rather think that will be about as much as I
+can do here, now." This was uttered with so much _naivete_ that I could
+hardly believe it was the same man who, a moment before, had shown so
+much shrewd distrust of oral relations of facts.
+
+I inquired when we might expect the work "Some time in the course of the
+winter," he replied, "though it is likely to prove larger than I at
+first intended. We have got several volumes printed, but I find I must
+add to the matter considerably, in order to dispose of the subject. I
+thought I should get rid of it in seven volumes, which are already
+written, but it will reach, I think, to nine." "If you have two still to
+write, I shall not expect to see the book before spring." "You may: let
+me once get back to Abbotsford, and I'll soon knock off those two
+fellows." To this I had nothing to say, although I thought such a _tour
+de force_ in writing might better suit invention than history.
+
+When he rose to go, I begged him to step into the _salon_, that I might
+have the gratification of introducing my wife to him. To this he very
+good-naturedly assented, and entering the room, after presenting Mrs.
+---- and my nephew W----. he took a seat. He sat some little time, and
+his fit of pleasantry returned, for he illustrated his discourse by one
+or two apt anecdotes, related with a slightly Scottish accent, that he
+seemed to drop and assume at will. Mrs. ---- observed to him that the
+_bergere_ in which he was seated had been twice honoured that morning,
+for General Lafayette had not left it more than half an hour. Sir Walter
+Scott looked surprised at this, and said inquiringly, "I thought he had
+gone to America, to pass the rest of his days." On my explaining the
+true state of the case, he merely observed, "He is a great man;" and yet
+I thought the remark was made coldly, or in complaisance to us.
+
+When Sir Walter left us, it was settled that I was to breakfast with him
+the following day but one. I was punctual, of course, and found him in a
+new silk _douillette_ that he had just purchased, trying "as hard as he
+could," as he pleasantly observed, to make a Frenchman of himself--an
+undertaking as little likely to be successful, I should think, in the
+case of his Scottish exterior, and Scottish interior too, as any
+experiment well could be. There were two or three visitors, besides Miss
+Ann Scott, his daughter, who was his companion in the journey. He was
+just answering an invitation from the Princesse ----, to an evening
+party, as I entered. "Here," said he, "you are a friend of the lady, and
+_parlez-vous_ so much better than I; can you tell me whether this is for
+_Jeudi_, or _Lundi_, or _Mardi_, or whether it means no day at all?" I
+told him the day of the week intended. "You get notes occasionally from
+the lady, or you could not read her scrawl so readily?" "She is very
+kind to us, and we often have occasion to read her writing." "Well, it
+is worth a very good dinner to get through a page of it." "I take my
+revenge in kind, and I fancy she has the worst of it." "I don't know,
+after all that she will get much the better of me with this _plume
+d'auberge._" He was quite right, for, although Sir Walter writes a
+smooth even hand, and one that appears rather well than otherwise on a
+page, it is one of the most difficult to decipher I have ever met with;
+the i's, u's, m's, n's, a's, e's, t's, etc., etc., for want of dots,
+crossings, and being fully rounded, looking all alike, and rendering the
+reading slow and difficult, without great familiarity with his mode of
+handling the pen: at least, I have found it so.
+
+He had sealed the note, and was about writing the direction, when he
+seemed at a loss. "How do you address this lady--as Her Highness?" I
+was much surprised at this question from him, for it denoted a want of
+familiarity with the world, that one would not have expected in a man
+who had been so very much and so long courted by the great. But, after
+all, his life has been provincial, though, as his daughter remarked in
+the course of the morning, they had no occasion to quit Scotland to see
+the world, all the world coming to see Scotland.
+
+The next morning he was with me again, for near an hour and we completed
+our little affair. After this we had a conversation on the law of
+copyrights in the two countries, which as we possess a common language,
+is a subject of great national interest. I understood him to say that he
+had a double right in England to his works; one under a statute, and the
+other growing out of common law. Any one publishing a book, let it be
+written by whom it might, in England, duly complying with the law, can
+secure the right, whereas none but a _citizen_ can do the same in
+America. I regret to say that I misled him on the subject of our
+copyright law, which, after all, is not so much more illiberal than that
+of England as I had thought it.
+
+I told Sir Walter Scott, that, in order to secure a copyright in
+America, it was necessary the book should never have been published
+_anywhere else_. This was said under the popular notion of the matter;
+or that which is entertained among the booksellers. Reflection and
+examination have since convinced me of my error: the publication alluded
+to in the law can only mean publication in America; for, as the object
+of doing certain acts previously to publication is merely to forewarn
+the _American_ public that the right is reserved, there can be no motive
+for having reference to any other publication. It is, moreover, in
+conformity with the spirit of all laws to limit the meaning of their
+phrases by their proper jurisdiction. Let us suppose a case. An American
+writes a book, he sends a copy to England, where it is published in
+March complying with the terms of our own copyright law, as to the
+entries and notices, the same work is published here in April. Now will
+it be pretended that his right is lost, always providing that his own is
+the first _American_ publication? I do not see how it can be so by
+either the letter or the spirit of the law. The intention is to
+encourage the citizen to write, and to give him a just property in the
+fruits of his labour; and the precautionary provisions of the law are
+merely to prevent others from being injured for want of proper
+information. It is of no moment to either of these objects that the
+author of a work has already reaped emolument in a foreign country: the
+principle is to encourage literature by giving it all the advantages it
+can obtain.
+
+If these views are correct, why may not an English writer secure a right
+in this country, by selling it in season, to a citizen here? An
+equitable trust might not, probably would not be sufficient; but a _bona
+fide_ transfer for a valuable consideration, I begin to think, would. It
+seems to me that all the misconception which has existed on this point
+has arisen from supposing that the term _publication_ refers to other
+than a publication in the country. But, when one remembers how rare it
+is to get lawyers to agree on a question like this, it becomes a layman
+to advance his opinion with great humility. I suppose, after all a good
+way of getting an accurate notion of the meaning of the law, would be to
+toss a dollar into the air, and cry "heads," or "tails." Sir Walter
+Scott seemed fully aware of the great circulation of his books in
+America, as well as how much he lost by not being able to secure a
+copyright. Still he admitted they produced him something. Our
+conversation on this subject terminated by a frank offer, on his part,
+of aiding me with the publishers of his own country;[16] but, although
+grateful for the kindness, I was not so circumstanced as to be able to
+profit by it.
+
+[Footnote 16: An offer that was twice renewed, after intervals of several
+years.]
+
+He did not appear to me to be pleased with Paris. His notions of the
+French were pretty accurate, though clearly not free from the old
+fashioned prejudices. "After all," he remarked, "I am a true Scot,
+never, except on this occasion, and the short visit I made to Paris in
+1815, having been out of my own country, unless to visit England, and I
+have even done very little of the latter." I understood him to say he
+had never been in Ireland, at all.
+
+I met him once more, in the evening, at the hotel of the Princesse ----.
+The party had been got together in a hurry, and was not large. Our
+hostess contrived to assemble some exceedingly clever people, however,
+among whom were one or two women, who are already historical, and whom I
+had fancied long since dead. All the female part of the company, with
+the silent delicacy that the French so well understand, appeared with
+ribbons, hats, or ornaments of some sort or other, of a Scottish stamp.
+Indeed, almost the only woman in the room, that did not appear to be a
+Caledonian was Miss Scott. She was in half-mourning, and, with her black
+eyes and jet-black hair, might very well have passed for a French woman,
+but for a slight peculiarity about the cheek-bones. She looked
+exceedingly well, and was much admired. Having two or three more places
+to go to, they stayed but an hour. As a matter of course, all the French
+women were exceedingly _empressees_ in their manner towards the Great
+Unknown; and as there were three or four that were very exaggerated on
+the score of romance, he was quite lucky if he escaped some absurdities.
+Nothing could be more patient than his manner, under it all; but as soon
+as he very well could, he got into a corner, where I went to speak to
+him. He said, laughingly, that he spoke French with so much difficulty,
+he was embarrassed to answer the compliments. "I am as good a lion as
+needs be, allowing my mane to be stroked as familiarly as they please,
+but I can't growl for them, in French. How is it with you?" Disclaiming
+the necessity of being either a good or a bad lion, being very little
+troubled in that way, for his amusement I related to him an anecdote.
+Pointing out to him a Comtesse de ----, who was present, I told him, I
+had met this lady once a week for several months, and at every _soiree_
+she invariably sailed up to me to say--"Oh, Monsieur ----, quelles
+livres!--vos charmans livres--que vos livres sont charmans!" and I had
+just made up my mind that she was, at least, a woman of taste, when she
+approached me with the utmost _sang-froid_, and cried-- "Bon soir,
+Monsieur ----; je viens d'acheter tous vos livres, et je compte profiter
+de la premiere occasion pour les lire!"
+
+I took leave of him in the ante-chamber, as he went away, for he was to
+quit Paris the following evening.
+
+Sir Walter Scott's person and manner have been so often described, that
+you will not ask much of me in this way, especially as I saw so little
+of him. His frame is large and muscular, his walk difficult, in
+appearance, though be boasted himself a vigorous mountaineer, and his
+action, in general, measured and heavy. His features and countenance
+were very Scottish, with the short thick nose, heavy lips, and massive
+cheeks. The superior or intellectual part of his head was neither deep
+nor broad, but perhaps the reverse, though singularly high. Indeed, it
+is quite uncommon to see a scull so round and tower-like in the
+formation, though I have met with them in individuals not at all
+distinguished for talents. I do not think a casual observer would find
+anything unusual in the exterior of Sir Walter Scott, beyond his
+physical force, which is great, without being at all extraordinary. His
+eye, however, is certainly remarkable. Grey, small, and without lustre,
+in his graver moments it appears to look inward, instead of regarding
+external objects, in a way, though the expression, more or less, belongs
+to abstraction, that I have never seen equalled. His smile is
+good-natured and social; and when he is in the mood, as happened to be
+the fact so often in our brief intercourse as to lead me to think it
+characteristic of the man, his eye would lighten with a great deal of
+latent fun. He spoke more freely of his private affairs than I had
+reason to expect, though our business introduced the subject naturally;
+and, at such times, I thought the expression changed to a sort of
+melancholy resolution, that was not wanting in sublimity.
+
+The manner of Sir Walter Scott is that of a man accustomed to see much
+of the world without being exactly a man of the world himself. He has
+evidently great social tact, perfect self-possession, is quiet, and
+absolutely without pretension, and has much dignity; and yet it struck
+me that he wanted the ease and _aplomb_ of one accustomed to live with
+his equals. The fact of his being a lion may produce some such effect;
+but I am mistaken if it be not more the influence of early habits and
+opinions than of anything else.
+
+Scott has been so much the mark of society, that it has evidently
+changed his natural manner, which is far less restrained than it is his
+habit to be in the world. I do not mean by this, the mere restraint of
+decorum, but a drilled simplicity or demureness, like that of girls who
+are curbed in their tendency to fun and light-heartedness, by the dread
+of observation. I have seldom known a man of his years, whose manner was
+so different in a _tete-a-tete_, and in the presence of a third person.
+In Edinburgh the circle must be small, and he probably knows every one.
+If strangers do go there, they do not go all at once, and of course the
+old faces form the great majority; so that he finds himself always on
+familiar ground. I can readily imagine that in Auld Reekie, and among
+the proper set, warmed perhaps by a glass of mountain-dew, Sir Walter
+Scott, in his peculiar way, is one of the pleasantest companions the
+world holds.
+
+There was a certain M. de ---- at the _soiree_ of the Princesse ----,
+who has obtained some notoriety as the writer of novels. I had, the
+honour of being introduced to this person, and was much amused with one
+of his questions. You are to understand that the vaguest possible
+notions exist in France on the subject of the United States. Empires,
+states, continents, and islands are blended in inextricable confusion, in
+the minds of a large majority of even the intelligent classes, and we
+sometimes hear the oddest ideas imaginable. This ignorance, quite
+pardonable in part, is not confined to France by any means, but exists
+even in England, a country that ought to know us better. It would seem
+that M. de ----, either because I was a shade or two whiter than
+himself, or because he did not conceive it possible that an American
+could write a book (for in this quarter of the world there is a strong
+tendency to believe that every man whose name crosses the ocean from
+America is merely some European who has gone there), or from some cause
+that to me is inexplicable, took it into his head that I was an
+Englishman who had amused a leisure year or two in the Western
+Hemisphere. After asking me a few questions concerning the country, he
+very coolly continued--"Et combien de temps avez-vous passe en Amerique,
+monsieur?" Comprehending his mistake, for a little practice here makes
+one quick in such matters, I answered, "Monsieur, nous y sommes depuis
+deux siecles." I question if M. de ---- has yet recovered from his
+surprise!
+
+The French, when their general cleverness is considered, are singularly
+ignorant of the habits, institutions, and civilization of other
+countries. This is in part owing to their being little addicted to
+travelling. Their commercial enterprise is not great; for though we
+occasionally see a Frenchman carrying with him into pursuits of this
+nature the comprehensive views, and one might almost say, the
+philosophy, that distinguish the real intelligence of the country, such
+instances are rare, the prevailing character of their commerce being
+caution and close dealing. Like the people of all great nations, their
+attention is drawn more to themselves than to others; and then the want
+of a knowledge of foreign languages has greatly contributed to their
+ignorance. This want of knowledge of foreign languages, in a nation that
+has traversed Europe as conquerors, is owing to the fact that they have
+either carried their own language with them, or met it everywhere. It is
+a want, moreover, that belongs rather to the last generation than to the
+present; the returned emigrants having brought back with them a taste
+for English, German, Italian, and Spanish, which has communicated itself
+to all, or nearly all, the educated people of the country. English, in
+particular, is now very generally studied; and perhaps, relatively, more
+French, under thirty years of age, are to be found in Paris who speak
+English, than Americans, of the same age, are to be found in New York
+who speak French.
+
+I think the limited powers of the language, and the rigid laws to which
+it has been subjected, contribute to render the French less acquainted
+with foreign nations than they would otherwise be. In all their
+translations there is an effort to render the word, however peculiar may
+be its meaning, into the French tongue. Thus, "township" and "city," met
+with in an American book, would probably be rendered by "_canton_" or
+"_commune_" or "_ville_;" neither of which conveys an accurate idea of
+the thing intended. In an English or American book we should introduce
+the French word at once, which would induce the reader to inquire into
+the differences that exist between the minor territorial divisions, of
+his own country, and those of the country of which he is reading. In
+this manner is the door open for further information, until both writers
+and readers come to find it easier and more agreeable to borrow words
+from others, than to curtail their ideas by their national vocabularies.
+The French, however, are beginning to feel their poverty in this
+respect, and some are already bold enough to resort to the natural cure.
+
+The habit of thinking of other nations through their own customs,
+betrays the people of this country into many ridiculous mistakes. One
+hears here the queerest questions imaginable every day; all of which,
+veiled by the good breeding and delicacy that characterize the nation,
+betray an innocent sense of superiority that may be smiled at, and which
+creates no feeling of resentment. A _savant_ lately named to me the
+coasting tonnage of France, evidently with the expectation of exciting
+my admiration; and on my receiving the information coolly, he inquired,
+with a little sarcasm of manner--"Without doubt, you have some coasting
+tonnage also in America?" "The coasting tonnage of the United Slates,
+Monsieur, is greater than the entire tonnage of France." The man looked
+astonished, and I was covered with questions as to the nature of the
+trade that required so much shipping among a population numerically so
+small. It could not possibly be the consumption of a country--he did not
+say it, but he evidently thought it--so insignificant and poor? I told
+him, that bread, wine, and every other article of the first necessity
+excepted, the other consumption of America, especially in luxuries, did
+not fall so much short of that of France as he imagined, owing to the
+great abundance in which the middling and lower classes lived. Unlike
+Europe, articles that were imported were mere necessaries of life, in
+America, such as tea, coffee, sugar, etc. etc., the lowest labourer
+usually indulging in them. He left me evidently impressed with new
+notions, for there is a desire to learn mingled with all their vanity.
+
+But I will relate a laughable blunder of a translator, by way of giving
+you a familiar example of the manner in which the French fall into error
+concerning the condition of other nations, and to illustrate my meaning.
+In one of the recent American novels that have been circulated here, a
+character is made to betray confusion, by tracing lines on the table,
+after dinner, with some wine that had been spilt; a sort of idle
+occupation sufficiently common to allow the allusion to be understood by
+every American. The sentence was faithfully rendered; but, not satisfied
+with giving his original, the translator annexes a note, in which he
+says, "One sees by this little trait, that the use of table-cloths, at
+the time of the American Revolution, was unknown in America!" You will
+understand the train of reasoning that led him to this conclusion. In
+France the cover is laid, perhaps, on a coarse table of oak, or even of
+pine, and the cloth is never drawn; the men leaving the table with the
+women. In America, the table is of highly polished mahogany, the cloth
+is removed, and the men sit, as in England. Now the French custom was
+supposed to be the custom of mankind, and wine could not be traced on
+the wood had there been a cloth; America was a young and semi-civilized
+nation, and, _ergo_, in 1779, there could have been no table-cloths
+known in America!--When men even visit a people of whom they have been
+accustomed to think in this way, they use their eyes through the medium
+of the imagination. I lately met a French traveller who affirmed that
+the use of carpets was hardly known among us.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XIII.
+
+French Manufactures.--Sevres China.--Tapestry of the Gobelins.--Paper
+for Hangings.--The Savonnerie.--French Carpets.--American Carpets.
+--Transfer of old Pictures from Wood to Canvass.--Coronation Coach.
+--The Arts in France--in America.--American Prejudice.
+
+
+To JAMES E. DE KAY, ESQUIRE.
+
+In my last, I gave you a few examples of the instances in which the
+French have mistaken the relative civilization of their country and
+America, and I shall now give you some in which we have fallen into the
+same error, or the other side of the question.
+
+There has lately been an exhibition of articles of French manufacture,
+at Paris; one of, I believe, the triennial collections of this
+character, that have been established here. The court of the Louvre was
+filled with temporary booths for the occasion, and vast ranges of the
+unfinished apartments in that magnificent palace have been thrown open
+for the same purpose. The court of the Louvre, of itself, is an area
+rather more than four hundred feet square, and I should think fully a
+quarter of a mile of rooms in the building itself are to be added to the
+space occupied for this purpose.
+
+The first idea, with which I was impressed, on walking through the
+booths and galleries, on this occasion, was the great disproportion
+between the objects purely of taste and luxury, and the objects of use.
+The former abounded, were very generally elegant and well-imagined,
+while the latter betrayed the condition of a nation whose civilization
+has commenced with the summit, instead of the base of society.
+
+In France, nearly every improvement in machinery is the result of
+scientific research; is unobjectionable in principles, profound in the
+adaptation of its parts to the end, and commonly beautiful in form. But
+it ends here, rarely penetrating the mass, and producing positive
+results. The Conservatoire des Arts, for instance, is full of beautiful
+and ingenious ploughs; while France is tilled with heavy, costly, and
+cumbrous implements of this nature. One sees light mould turning up,
+here, under a sort of agricultural _diligences_, drawn by four, and even
+six heavy horses, which in America would be done quite as well, and much
+sooner, by two. You know I am farmer enough to understand what I say, on
+a point like this. In France, the cutlery, ironware, glass,
+door-fastenings, hinges, locks, fire-irons, axes, hatchets, carpenter's
+tools, and, in short, almost everything that is connected with homely
+industry and homely comfort, is inferior to the same thing in America.
+It is true, many of our articles are imported, but this produces no
+change in the habits of the respective people; our manufactories are
+merely in Birmingham, instead of being in Philadelphia.
+
+I have now been long enough in France to understand that seeing an
+article in an exhibition like the one I am describing, is no proof that
+it enters at all into the comforts and civilization of the nation,
+although it may be an object as homely as a harrow or a spade. The
+scientific part of the country has little influence, in this way, on the
+operative. The chasm between knowledge and ignorance is so vast in
+France, that it requires a long time for the simplest idea to find its
+way across it.
+
+Exhibitions are everywhere bad guides to the average civilization of a
+country, as it is usual to expose only the objects that have been
+wrought with the greatest care. In a popular sense, they are proofs of
+what can be done, rather than of what _is_ done. The cloths that I saw
+in the booths, for instance, are not to be met with in the shops; the
+specimens of fire-arms, glass, cutlery, etc., etc., too, are all much
+superior to anything one finds on sale. But this is the case everywhere,
+from the boarding-school to the military parade, men invariably putting
+the best foot foremost when they are to be especially inspected. This is
+not the difference I mean. Familiar as every American, at all accustomed
+to the usages of genteel life in his own country, must be with the
+better manufactures of Great Britain, I think he would be struck by the
+inferiority of even the best specimens of the commoner articles that
+were here laid before the public. But when it came to the articles of
+elegance and luxury, as connected with forms, taste, and execution,
+though not always in ingenuity and extent of comfort, I should think
+that no Englishman, let his rank in life be what it would, could pass
+through this wilderness of elegancies without wonder.
+
+Even the manufactures in which we, or rather the English (for I now
+refer more to use than to production), ordinarily excel, such as
+carpets, rugs, porcelain, plate, and all the higher articles of personal
+comfort, _as exceptions_, surpass those of which we have any notion. I
+say, _as exceptions_, not in the sense by which we distinguish the
+extraordinary efforts of the ordinary manufacturer, in order to make a
+figure at an exhibition, but certain objects produced in certain
+exclusive establishments that are chiefly the property of the crown, as
+they have been the offspring of regal taste and magnificence.
+
+Of this latter character is the Sevres china. There are manufactures of
+this name of a quality that brings them within the reach of moderate
+fortunes, it is true; but one obtains no idea of the length to which
+luxury and taste have been pushed in this branch of art without
+examining the objects made especially for the king, who is in the habit
+of distributing them as presents among the crowned heads and his
+personal favourites. After the ware has been made with the greatest care
+and of the best materials, artists of celebrity are employed to paint
+it. You can easily imagine the value of these articles, when you
+remember that each plate has a design of its own, beautifully executed
+in colours, and presenting a landscape or an historical subject that is
+fit to be framed and suspended in a gallery. One or two of the artists
+employed in this manner have great reputations, and it is no uncommon
+thing to see miniatures in gilded frames which, on examination, prove to
+be on porcelain. Of course the painting has been subject to the action
+of heat in the baking. As respects the miniatures, there is not much to
+be said in their favour. They are well drawn and well enough coloured;
+but the process and the material give them a glossy, unnatural
+appearance, which must prevent them from ever being considered as more
+than so many _tours de force_ in the arts. But on vases, dinner-sets,
+and all ornamental furniture of this nature, in which we look for the
+peculiarities of the material, they produce a magnificence of effect
+that I cannot describe. Vases of the value of ten or fifteen thousand
+francs, or even of more money, are not uncommon; and at the exhibition
+there was a little table, the price of which I believe was two thousand
+dollars, that was a perfect treasure in its way.
+
+Busts, and even statues, I believe, have been attempted in this branch
+of art. This of course is enlisting the statuary as well as the painter
+in its service. I remember to have seen, when at Sevres, many busts of
+the late Duc de Berri in the process of drying, previously to being put
+into the oven. Our cicerone on that occasion made us laugh by the
+routine with which he went through his catalogue of wonders. He had
+pointed out to us the unbaked busts in a particular room, and on
+entering another apartment, where the baked busts were standing, he
+exclaimed--"Ah! voila son Altesse Royale toute cuite." This is just the
+amount of the criticism I should hazard on this branch of the Sevres
+art, or on that which exceeds its legitimate limits--"Behold his Royal
+Highness, ready cooked."
+
+The value of some of the single plates must be very considerable, and
+the king frequently, in presenting a solitary vase, or ornament of the
+Sevres porcelain, presents thousands.
+
+The tapestry is another of the costly works that it has suited the
+policy of France to keep up, while her ploughs, and axes, and carts, and
+other ordinary implements, are still so primitive and awkward. The
+exhibition contained many specimens from the Gobelins that greatly
+surpassed my expectations. They were chiefly historical subjects, with
+the figures larger than life, and might very well have passed with a
+novice, at a little distance, for oil-paintings. The dimensions of the
+apartment are taken, and the subject is designed, of course, on a scale
+suited to the room. The effect of this species of ornament is very noble
+and imposing, and the tapestries have the additional merit of warmth and
+comfort. Hangings in cloth are very common in Paris, but the tapestry of
+the Gobelins is chiefly confined to the royal palaces. Our neighbour the
+Duc de ---- has some of it, however, in his hotel, a present from the
+king; but the colours are much faded, and the work is otherwise the
+worse for time. I have heard him say that one piece he has, even in its
+dilapidated state, is valued at seven thousand francs. Occasionally a
+little of this tapestry is found in this manner in the great hotels;
+but, as a rule, its use is strictly royal.
+
+The paper for hangings is another article in which the French excel. We
+get very pretty specimens of their skill in this manufacture in America,
+but, with occasional exceptions, nothing that is strictly magnificent
+finds its way into our markets. I was much struck with some of these
+hangings that were made to imitate velvet. The cloth appeared to be
+actually incorporated with the paper, and by no ingenuity of which I was
+master could I detect the means. The style of paper is common enough
+everywhere, but this exhibition had qualities far surpassing anything of
+the sort I had ever before seen. Curiosity has since led me to the
+paper-maker, in order to penetrate the secrets of his art; and there,
+like the affair of Columbus and the egg, I found the whole thing as
+simple as heart could wish. You will probably smile when you learn the
+process by which paper is converted into velvet, which is briefly
+this:--
+
+Wooden moulds are used to stamp the designs, each colour being put on,
+by laying a separate mould on its proper place, one mould being used
+after another, though only one is used on any particular occasion. Thus,
+all the black is put on now, the green to-morrow, and the yellow next
+day. As to the velvets, they are produced as follows:--Wool is chopped
+fine, and dyed the desired hue. I am not certain that cotton, or even
+other materials, may not be used. This chopped and coloured wool is
+thrown into a tub; the mould is covered with some glutinous substance,
+and, when applied, it leaves on the paper the adhesive property, as
+types leave the ink. The paper passes immediately over the tub, and a
+boy throws on the wool. A light blow or two, of a rattan, tosses it
+about, and finally throws all back again into the tub that has not
+touched the glue. The _printed_ part, of course, is covered with blue,
+or purple, or scarlet wood, and is converted, by a touch of the wand,
+into velvet! The process of covering a yard lasts about ten seconds, and
+I should think considerably more than a hundred yards of paper could be
+velvetized in an hour. We laughed at the discovery, and came away
+satisfied that Solomon could have known nothing about manufacturing
+paper-hangings, or he would not have said there was nothing "new under
+the sun."
+
+But the manufacture of France that struck me as being strictly in the
+best taste, in which perfection and magnificence are attained without
+recourse to conceits, or doing violence to any of the proprieties, are
+the products of the Savonnerie, and the exquisitely designed and
+executed works of Beauvais. These include chair bottoms and backs,
+hangings for rooms, and, I believe, carpets. At all events, if the
+carpets do not come from these places, they are quite worthy to have
+that extraction. Flowers, arabesques, and other similar designs,
+exquisitely coloured and drawn, chiefly limit the efforts of the former;
+and the carpets were in single pieces, and made to fit the room. Nothing
+that you have ever seen, or probably have imagined, at all equals the
+magnificence of some of these princely carpets. Indeed, I know nothing
+that runs a closer parallel to the general civilization between France
+and England, and I might almost add of America, than the history of
+their respective carpets. In France, a vast majority of the people
+hardly know what a carpet is. They use mud floors, or, rising a little
+above the very lowest classes, coarse stone and rude tiles are
+substituted. The middling classes, out of the large towns, have little
+else besides painted tiles. The wooden _parquet_ is met with, in all the
+better houses, and is well made and well kept. There is a finish and
+beauty about them, that is not misplaced even in a palace. Among all
+these classes, until quite lately, carpets were unknown, or at least
+they were confined to the very highest class of society. The great
+influx of English has introduced them into the public hotels and common
+lodging-houses; but I have visited among many French of rank and
+fortune, in the dead of winter, and found no carpets. A few of a very
+coarse quality, made of rags, adroitly tortured into laboured designs,
+are seen, it is true, even in indifferent houses; but the rule is as I
+have told you. In short, carpets, in this country, until quite lately,
+have been deemed articles of high luxury; and, like nearly everything
+else that is magnificent and luxurious, at the point where they have
+been taken up, they infinitely exceed anything of the sort in England.
+The classical designs, perfect drawings, and brilliant colours, defeat
+every effort to surpass them,--I had almost said, all competition.
+
+In all America, except in the new regions, with here and there a
+dwelling on the frontier, there is scarcely a house to be found without
+carpets, the owners of which are at all above the labouring classes.
+Even in many of the latter they are to be found. We are carpeted,
+frequently, from the kitchen to the garret; the richness and rarity of
+the manufacture increasing as we ascend in the scale of wealth and
+fashion, until we reach the uttermost limits of our habits--a point
+where beauty and neatness verge upon elegance and magnificence. At this
+point, however, we stop, and the turn of the French commences. Now this
+is the history of the comparative civilization of the two countries, in
+a multitude of other matters; perhaps, it would be better to say, it is
+the general comparative history of the two countries. The English differ
+from us, only, in carrying their scale both higher and lower than
+ourselves; in being sometimes magnificent, and sometimes impoverished;
+but, rarely, indeed, do they equal the French in the light, classical,
+and elegant taste that so eminently distinguishes these people. There is
+something ponderous and purse-proud about the magnificence of England,
+that is scarcely ever visible here; though taste is evidently and
+rapidly on the increase in England on the one hand, as comfort is here
+on the other. The French have even partially adopted the two words
+"fashionable" and "comfortable."
+
+One of the most curious things connected with the arts in France, is
+that of transferring old pictures from wood to canvass. A large
+proportion of the paintings of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries
+were done on wood or copper, and many of the former are, or have been,
+in danger of being lost, from decay. In order to meet the evil, a
+process has been invented by which the painting is transferred to
+canvass, where it remains, to all appearance, as good as ever. I have
+taken some pains to ascertain in what manner this nice operation is
+performed. I have seen pictures in various stages of the process, though
+I have never watched any one through it all; and, in one instance, I saw
+a small Wouvermans stripped to the shirt, if it may be so expressed, or,
+in other words, _when it was nothing but paint_. From what I have seen
+and been told, I understand the mode of effecting this delicate and
+almost incredible operation to be as follows:--
+
+A glue is rubbed over the face of the picture, which is then laid on a
+piece of canvass that is properly stretched and secured, to receive it.
+Weights are now laid on the back of the picture, and it is left for a
+day or two, in order that the glue may harden. The weights are then
+removed, and the operator commences removing the wood, first with a
+plane, and, when he approaches the paint, with sharp delicate chisels.
+The paint is kept in its place by the canvass to which it is glued, and
+which is itself secured to the table; and although the entire body of
+the colours, hardened as it is by time, is usually not thicker than a
+thin wafer, the wood is commonly taken entirely from it. Should a thin
+fragment be left, however, or a crack made in the paint, it is
+considered of no great moment. The Wouvermans alluded to, was pure
+paint, however, and I was shown the pieces of wood, much worm-eaten,
+that had been removed. When the wood is away, glue is applied to the
+_back of the paint_, and to the canvass on which it is intended the
+picture shall remain. The latter is then laid on the paint; new weights
+are placed above it, and they are left two or three days longer, for
+this new glue to harden. When it is thought the adhesion between the
+second canvass and the paint is sufficient, the weights are removed, the
+picture is turned, and warm water is used in loosening the first canvass
+from the face of the picture, until it can be stripped off. More or less
+of the varnish of the picture usually comes off with the glue, rendering
+the separation easier. The painting is then cleaned, retouched, and,
+should it be necessary, varnished and framed; after which it commonly
+looks as well, and is really as sound and as good as ever, so far, at
+least, as the consistency is concerned.
+
+Among other wonders in the exhibition, was the coronation coach of
+Charles X. This carriage is truly magnificent. It is quite large, as
+indeed are all the royal carriages, perhaps as large as an American
+stage-coach; the glass, pure and spotless as air, goes all round the
+upper compartments, so as to admit of a view of the whole interior; the
+panels are beautifully painted in design; the top has gilded and
+well-formed angels blowing trumpets, and the crown of France surmounts
+the centre. The wheels, and train, and pole, are red, striped with gold.
+All the leather is red morocco, gilt, as is the harness. Plumes of
+ostrich feathers ornament the angles, and, altogether, it is a most
+glittering and gorgeous vehicle. The paintings, the gildings, and all
+the details are well executed, except the running gear, which struck me
+as clumsy and imperfect. The cost is said to have been about sixty
+thousand dollars.
+
+Many new rooms in the Louvre were thrown open on this occasion, in order
+that the paintings on their ceilings might be viewed; and as I walked
+through this gorgeous magnificence, I felt how small were our highest
+pretensions to anything like elegance or splendour. The very extreme of
+art, of this nature, may, of itself, be of no great direct benefit, it
+is true; but is should be remembered, that the skill which produces
+these extraordinary fruits, in its road to the higher points of
+magnificence, produces all that embellishes life in the intermediate
+gradations.
+
+In America, in the eagerness of gain, and with the contracted habits
+that a love of gain engenders, which by their own avidity, as is usual
+with the grosser passions, too often defeat their own ends, we overlook
+the vast importance of cultivating the fine arts, even in a pecuniary
+sense, to say nothing of the increased means of enjoying the very money
+that is so blindly pursued, which their possession entails. France is at
+this moment laying all Christendom under contribution, simply by means
+of her taste. Italy, where the arts have flourished still longer, and
+where they have still more effectually penetrated society, would drive
+the English and French out of every market on earth, were the national
+energy at all equal to the national tastes. These things do not as
+exclusively belong to extreme luxury as they may at first seem. Science,
+skill of the nicest investigation, and great research, are all enlisted
+in their behalf; and, in time, implements of the most homely uses derive
+perfection, as by-plays, from the investigations consequent on the
+production of luxuries. It is true, that, by blending a certain amount
+of information with practice, as in the case of the American labourer,
+our wants find the means of furnishing their own supplies; but, apart
+from the fact that the man who makes a chair is not obliged to sit in
+it, and is therefore content to consult his profits merely, the impulses
+of practice are much aided by the accumulated knowledge of study. The
+influence that the arts of design have had on the French manufactures is
+incalculable. They have brought in the aid of chemistry, and
+mathematics, and a knowledge of antiquity; and we can trace the effects
+in the bronzes, the porcelain, the hangings, the chintzes, the silks,
+down to the very ribands of the country. We shall in vain endeavour to
+compete with the great European nations, unless we make stronger efforts
+to cultivate the fine arts. Of what avails our beautiful glass, unless
+we know how to cut it? or of what great advantage, in the strife of
+industry, will be even the _skilful_ glass-cutter, should he not also be
+the _tasteful_ glass-cutter? It is true that classical forms and
+proportions are, as yet, of no great account among us; and the great
+mass of the American people still cling to their own uninstructed
+fancies, in preference to the outlines and proportions of the more
+approved models, and to those hues which art has demonstrated to be
+harmonious. This is the history of every society in its progress to
+perfection; and, cut off as we are from the rest of the civilized world,
+it is not to be expected that we are to make an extraordinary exception.
+But, while we may be satisfied with our own skill and taste, the happy
+lot of all ignorance, our customers will not have the same
+self-complacency, to induce them to become purchasers. We find this
+truth already. We beat all nations in the fabrication of common
+unstamped cottons. Were trade as free as some political economists
+pretend, we should drive all our competitors out of every market, as
+respects this one article. But the moment we attempt to print, or to
+meddle with that part of the business which requires taste, we find
+ourselves inferior to the Europeans, whose forms we are compelled to
+imitate, and of course to receive when no longer novel, and whose hues
+defy our art.
+
+The wisest thing the United States could do, would be to appropriate
+thirty or forty millions to the formation of a marine, not to secure the
+coast, as our hen-roost statesmen are always preaching, but to keep in
+our own hands the control of our own fortunes, by rendering our enmity
+or friendship of so much account to Europe that no power shall ever
+again dare trespass on our national rights:--and one of the next wisest
+measures, I honestly believe, would be to appropriate at once a million
+to the formation of a National Gallery, in which copies of the antique,
+antiques themselves, pictures, bronzes, arabesques, and other models of
+true taste, might be collected, before which the young aspirants for
+fame might study, and with which become imbued, as the preliminary step
+to an infusion of their merits into society. Without including the vast
+influence of such a cultivation on the manners, associations,
+intellects, and habits of the people--an influence that can scarcely be
+appreciated too highly--fifty years would see the first cost returned
+fifty-fold in the shape of the much-beloved dollars. Will this happen?
+Not till men of enlightened minds--_statesmen_, instead of _political
+partizans_--are sent to Washington. It is the misfortune of America to
+lie so remote from the rest of the civilized world, as to feel little of
+the impulses of a noble competition, our rivalry commonly limiting
+itself to the vulgar exhibitions of individual vanity; and this the more
+to our disadvantage, as, denied access to the best models for even this
+humble species of contention with the antagonists we are compelled to
+choose, victory is as bad as defeat.
+
+One of the great impediments to a high class of improvement in America,
+is the disposition to resent every intimation that we can be any better
+than we are at present. Few, perhaps no country, has ever enduced so
+much evil-disposed and unmerited abuse as our own. It is not difficult
+to trace the reasons, and every American should meet it with a just and
+manly indignation. But, being deemed a nation of rogues, barbarous, and
+manifesting the vices of an ancestry of convicts, is a very different
+thing from standing at the head of civilization. This tendency to repel
+every suggestion of inferiority is one of the surest signs of provincial
+habits; it is exactly the feeling with which the resident of the village
+resents what he calls the airs of the town, and that which the inland
+trader brings with him among those whom he terms the "dandies" of the
+sea-board. In short, it is the jealousy of inferiority on the exciting
+points; whatever may be the merits of its subject in other matters, and
+furnishes of itself the best possible proof that there is room for
+amendment. The French have a clever and pithy saying, that of--"On peut
+tout dire a un grand peuple." "One may tell all to a great nation."[17]
+
+[Footnote 17:--Every one was telling me that I should find the country so
+altered after an absence of eight years, that I should not know it.
+Altered, indeed, I found it, but not quite so evidently improved. It
+struck me that there was a vast expansion of mediocrity that was well
+enough in itself, but which was so overwhelming as nearly to overshadow
+everything that once stood prominent as more excellent. This was perhaps
+no more than a natural consequence of the elasticity and growth of a
+young, vigorous community, which, in its agregate character, as in that
+of its individuals, must pass through youth to arrive at manhood. Still
+it was painful and doubly so to one coming from Europe. I saw the towns
+increased, more tawdry than ever, but absolutely with less real taste
+than they had in my youth. The art of painting alone appeared to me to
+have made any material advances in the right direction, if one excepts
+increase in wealth, and in the facilities to create wealth. The
+steam-boats were the only objects that approached magnificence; but
+while they had increased in show, they had less comfort and
+respectability. The taverns, as a whole, had deteriorated; though the
+three first I happened to enter might well compete with a very high
+class of European inns, viz. Head's, Barnum's, and Gadsby's.]
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XIV.
+
+False Notions.--Continental Manners.--People of Paris.--Parisian Women.
+--French Beauty.--Men of France.--French Soldiers.
+
+
+To JAMES STEVENSON, ESQUIRE, ALBANY.
+
+I cannot tell you whence the vulgar notions that we entertain of the
+French, which, with many other pernicious prejudices, have made a part
+of our great inheritance from England, have been originally obtained.
+Certainly I have seen no thing, nor any person, after a long residence
+in the country, to serve as models to the flippant _marquis_, the
+overdressed courtiers, or the _petites maitresses_ of the English
+dramatists. Even a French _perruquier_ is quite as homely and plain a
+personage as an English or an American barber. But these Athenians
+grossly caricature themselves as well as their neighbours. Although
+Paris is pretty well garnished with English of all degrees, from the
+Duke down, it has never yet been my luck to encounter an English dandy.
+Now and then one meets with a "_dresser_," a man who thinks more of his
+appearance than becomes his manhood, or than comports with good
+breeding; and occasionally a woman is seen who is a mere appendage to
+her attire; but I am persuaded, that, as a rule, neither of these vulgar
+classes exists among people of any condition, in either country. It is
+impossible for me to say what changes the revolution, and the wars and
+the new notions, may have produced in France, but there is no sufficient
+reason for believing that the present cropped and fringeless,
+bewhiskered, and _laceless_ generation of France, differs more from
+their bewigged, belaced, and powdered predecessors, than the men and
+women of any other country differ from their particular ancestors. Boys
+wore cocked hats, and breaches, and swords, in America, previously to
+the revolution; and our immediate fathers flourished in scarlet coats,
+powder, ruffled fingers, and embroidered waistcoats.
+
+The manners of the continent of Europe are more finished than those of
+England, and while quiet and simplicity are the governing rules of good
+breeding everywhere, even in unsophisticated America, this quiet and
+simplicity is more gracious and more graceful in France than in the
+neighbouring island. As yet, I see no other difference in mere
+deportment, though there is abundance when one goes into the examination
+of character.
+
+I have met with a good many people of the old court at Paris, and though
+now and then there is a certain _roue_ atmosphere about them, both men
+and women, as if too much time had been passed at Coblentz, they have
+generally, in other respects, been models of elegant demeanour. Usually
+they are simple, dignified, and yet extremely gracious--gracious without
+the appearance of affability, a quality that is almost always indicative
+of a consciousness of superiority. The predominant fault of manner here
+is too strong a hand in applying flattery; but this is as much the fault
+of the head as of breeding. The French are fond of hearing pleasant
+things. They say themselves that "a Frenchman goes into society to make
+himself agreeable, and an Englishman to make himself disagreeable;" and
+the _dire_ is not altogether without foundation in truth. I never met a
+Frenchman in society here, who appeared to wish to enhance his
+importance by what are called "airs," though a coxcomb in feeling is an
+animal not altogether unknown to the natural history of Paris, nor is
+the zoological science of M. Cuvier indispensable to his discovery.
+
+I shall probably surprise you with one of my opinions. I think the
+population of Paris, physically speaking, finer than that of London.
+Fine men and fine women are, by no means, as frequent, after allowing
+for the difference in whole numbers, in the French, as in the English
+capital; but neither are there as many miserable, pallid, and squalid
+objects. The French are a smaller race than the English, much smaller
+than the race of English gentlemen, so many of whom congregate at
+London; but the population of Paris has a sturdy, healthful look, that I
+do not think is by any means as general in London. In making this
+comparison, allowance must be made for the better dress of the English,
+and for their fogs, whose effect is to bleach the skin and to give a
+colour that has no necessary connexion with the springs of life,
+although the female portion of the population of Paris has probably as
+much colour as that of London. It might possibly be safer to say that
+the female population of Paris is finer than that of London, though I
+think on the whole the males may be included also. I do not mean by
+this, that there is relatively as much female beauty in Paris as in
+London, for in this respect the latter has immeasurably the advantage;
+but, looks apart, that the _physique_ of the French of Paris is superior
+to that of the English of London. The population of Paris is a
+favourable specimen of that of the kingdom; while that of London,
+Westminster excepted, is not at all above the level of the entire
+country, if indeed it be as good.[18]
+
+[Footnote 18: This opinion remains the same in the writer, who between
+the years 1806 and 1833 has been six times in London, and between the
+years 1826 and 1833, five times in Paris. In 1833 he left Paris for
+London, sailing for home from the latter place. A few days after his
+arrival he went to Washington, where _during the session of Congress_,
+dress and air not considered, he thought he had never met so large a
+proportion of fine men in any part of the world. He was particularly
+struck with their size, as was an American friend who was with him, and
+who had also passed many years abroad, having left Liverpool the same
+day the writer sailed from Portsmouth.]
+
+The very general notion which exists in America, that the French are a
+slightly-built, airy people, and that their women in particular are thin
+and without _embonpoint_, is a most extraordinary one, for there is not
+a particle of foundation for it. The women of Paris are about as tall as
+the women of America, and, could a fair sample of the two nations be
+placed in the scales, I have no doubt it would be found that the French
+women would outweigh the Americans in the proportion of six to five.
+Instead of being meagre, they are compactly built, with good busts,
+inclining to be full, and well-limbed, as any one may see who will take
+the trouble to walk the streets after a hard shower; for, as Falstaff
+told Prince Henry, "You are straight enough in the shoulders; you care
+not who sees your back." Indeed, I know no females to whom the opinion
+which we entertain of the French women may better apply than to our own,
+and yet I know none who are so generally well-looking.
+
+The French are not a handsome nation. Personal beauty in either sex is
+rare: there is a want of simplicity, of repose, of dignity, and even of
+harmonious expression, what they themselves call _finesse_, in their
+countenances, and yet the liveliness of the eyes and the joyous
+character of their looks render them agreeable. You are not to
+understand from this that great personal beauty does not exist in
+France, however, for there are so many exceptions to the rule, that they
+have occasionally made me hesitate about believing it a rule at all. The
+French often possess a feature in great perfection that is very rare in
+England, where personal beauty is so common in both sexes. It is in the
+mouth, and particularly in the smile. Want of _finesse_ about the mouth
+is a general European deficiency (the Italians have more of it than any
+other people I know), and it is as prevalent an advantage in America.
+But the races of Saxon root fail in the chin, which wants nobleness and
+volume. Here it is quite common to see profiles that would seem in their
+proper places on a Roman coin.
+
+Although female beauty is not common in France, when it is found, it is
+usually of a very high order. The sweet, cherub-like, guileless
+expression that belongs to the English female face, and through it to
+the American, is hardly ever, perhaps never, met with here. The French
+countenance seldom conveys the idea of extreme infantile innocence. Even
+in the children there is a _manner_ which, while it does not absolutely
+convey an impression of an absence of the virtues, I think leaves less
+conviction of its belonging to the soul of the being, than the peculiar
+look I mean. One always sees _woman_--modest, amiable, _spirituelle_,
+feminine and attractive, if you will, in a French girl; while one
+sometimes sees an _angel_ in a young English or American face. I have no
+allusion now to religious education, or to religious feelings, which are
+quite as general in the sex, particularly the young of good families,
+under their characteristic distinctions, here as anywhere else. In this
+particular the great difference is, that in America it is religion, and
+in France it is infidelity, that is metaphysical.
+
+There is a coquettish prettiness that is quite common in France, in
+which air and manner are mingled with a certain sauciness of expression
+that is not easily described, but which, while it blends well enough
+with the style of the face, is rather pleasing than captivating. It
+marks the peculiar beauty of the _grisette_, who, with her little cap,
+hands stuck in the pockets of her apron, mincing walk, coquettish eye,
+and well-balanced head, is a creature perfectly _sui generis_. Such a
+girl is more like an actress imitating the character, than one is apt to
+imagine the character itself. I have met with imitators of these roguish
+beauties in a higher station, such as the wives and daughters of the
+industrious classes, as it is the fashion to call them here, and even
+among the banking community, but never among women of condition, whose
+deportment in France, whatever may be their morals, is usually marked by
+gentility of air, and a perfectly good tone of manner, always excepting
+that small taint of _roueism_ to which I have already alluded, and which
+certainly must have come from the camp and emigration.
+
+The highest style of the French beauty is the classical. I cannot recall
+a more lovely picture, a finer union of the grand and the feminine, than
+the Duchesse de ----, in full dress, at a carnival ball, where she shone
+peerless among hundreds of the _elite_ of Europe. I see her now, with
+her small, well-seated head; her large, dark, brilliant eye, rivetted on
+the mazes of a _Polonaise_, danced in character; her hair, black as the
+raven's wing, clustering over a brow of ivory; her graceful form
+slightly inclining forward in delighted and graceful attention; her
+features just Grecian enough to be a model of delicate beauty, just
+Roman enough to be noble; her colour heightened to that of youth by the
+heat of the room, and her costume, in which all the art of Paris was
+blended with a critical knowledge of the just and the becoming. And yet
+this woman was a grandmother!
+
+The men of France have the same physical and the same conventional
+peculiarities as the women. They are short, but sturdy. Including all
+France, for there is a material difference in this respect between the
+north and the south, I should think the average stature of the French
+men (not women) to be quite an inch and a half below the average stature
+of America, and possibly two inches. At home, I did not find myself
+greatly above the medium height, and in a crowd I was always compelled
+to stand on tiptoe to look over the heads of those around me; whereas,
+here, I am evidently _un grand_, and can see across the Champs Elysees
+without any difficulty. You may remember that I stand as near as may be
+to five feet ten; it follows that five feet ten is rather a tall man in
+France. You are not to suppose, however, that there are not occasionally
+men of great stature in this country. One of the largest men I have ever
+seen appears daily in the garden of the Tuileries, and I am told he is a
+Frenchman of one of the north-eastern provinces. That part of the
+kingdom is German rather than French, however, and the population still
+retain most of the peculiarities of their origin.
+
+The army has a look of service and activity rather than of force. I
+should think it more formidable by its manoeuvres than its charges.
+Indeed, the tactics of Napoleon, who used the legs of his troops more
+than their muskets, aiming at concentrating masses on important points,
+goes to show that he depended on alertness instead of _bottom_. This is
+just the quality that would be most likely to prevail against your
+methodical, slow-thinking, and slow-moving German; and I make no
+question the short, sturdy, nimble legs of the little warriors of this
+country have gained many a field.
+
+A general officer, himself a six-footer, told me, lately, that they had
+found the tall men of very little use in the field, from their inability
+to endure the fatigues of a campaign. When armies shall march on
+railroads, and manoeuvre by steam, the grenadiers will come in play
+again; but as it is, the French are admirably adapted by their
+_physique_ to return the career that history has given them. The Romans
+resembled them in this respect, Cicero admitting that many people
+excelled them in size, strength, beauty, and even learning, though he
+claimed a superiority for his countrymen, on the score of love of
+country and reverence for the gods. The French are certainly patriotic
+enough, though their reverence for the gods may possibly be questioned.
+
+The regiments of the guards, the heavy cavalry, and the artillery are
+all filled with men chosen with some care. These troops would, I think,
+form about an average American army, on the score of size. The
+battalions of the line receive the rest. As much attention is bestowed
+in adapting the duty to the _physique_, and entire corps are composed of
+men of as nearly as possible the same physical force, some of the
+regiments certainly make but an indifferent figure, as to dimensions,
+while others appear particularly well. Still, if not overworked, I
+should think these short men would do good service. I think I have seen
+one or two regiments, in which the average height has not exceeded five
+feet three inches. The chances of not being hit in such a corps are
+worth something, for the proportion, compared to the chances in a corps
+of six-footers, is as sixty-three to seventy-two, or is one-eighth in
+favour of the Lilliputians. I believe the rule for retreating is when
+one-third of the men are _hors de combat_.
+
+Now, supposing a regiment of three thousand grenadiers were obliged to
+retire with a loss of one thousand men, the little fellows, under the
+same fire, should have, at the same time, two thousand one hundred and
+thirty-seven sound men left, and of course, unless bullied out of it,
+they ought to gain the day.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XV.
+
+Perversion of Institutions.--The French Academy.--Laplace.--Astronomy.
+--Theatres of Paris.--Immoral Plot.--Artificial Feelings.--French
+Tragedy.--Literary Mania.--The American Press.--American
+Newspapers.--French Journals--Publishing Manoeuvres.--Madame Malibran.
+
+
+To JAMES E. DE KAY, ESQUIRE.
+
+It appears to be the melancholy lot of humanity, that every institution
+which ingenuity can devise shall be perverted to an end different from
+the legitimate. If we plan a democracy, the craven wretch who, in a
+despotism, would be the parasite of a monarch, heads us off, and gets
+the best of it under the pretence of extreme love for the people; if we
+flatter ourselves that by throwing power into the hands of the rich and
+noble, it is put beyond the temptation to abuse it, we soon discover
+that rich is a term of convention, no one thinking he has enough until
+he has all, and that nobility of station has no absolute connexion with
+nobleness of spirit or of conduct; if we confide all to one, indolence,
+favouritism, and indeed the impossibility of supervision, throws us
+again into the hands of the demagogue, in his new, or rather true
+character of a courtier. So it is with life; in politics, religion,
+arms, arts and letters, yea, even the republic of letters, as it is
+called, is the prey of schemes and parasites, and things _in fact_, are
+very different from things _as they seem to be_.
+
+"In the seventeen years that I have been a married man," said Captain
+---- of the British navy, "I have passed but seventeen months with my
+wife and family," "But, now there is peace, you will pass a few years
+quietly in America, to look after your affairs," said I, by way of
+awkward condolence. "No, indeed; I shall return to England as soon as
+possible, to make up for lost time. I have been kept so much at sea,
+that they have forgotten me at home, and duty to my children requires
+that I should be on the spot." In the simplicity of my heart, I thought
+this strange, and yet nothing could be more true. Captain ---- was a
+scion of the English aristocracy, and looked to his sword for his
+fortune. Storms, fagging, cruising, all were of small avail compared to
+interest at the Admiralty, and so it is with all things else, whether in
+Europe or America. The man who really gains the victory, is lucky,
+indeed, if he obtain the meed of his skill and valour. You may be
+curious to know of what all this is _a propos?_ To be frank with, you, I
+have visited the French Academy--"ces quarante qui ont l'esprit comme
+quatre," and have come away fully impressed with the vanity of human
+things!
+
+The occasion was the reception of two or three new members, when,
+according to a settled usage, the successful candidates pronounced
+eulogies on their predecessors. You may be curious to know what
+impression the assembled genius of France produced on a stranger from
+the western world. I can only answer, none. The Academy of the Sciences
+can scarcely ever be less than distinguished in such a nation; but when
+I came to look about me, and to inquire after the purely literary men, I
+was forcibly struck with the feebleness of the catalogue of names. Not
+one in five was at all known to me, and very few, even of those who
+were, could properly be classed among the celebrated writers of the day.
+As France has many very clever men who were not on the list, I was
+desirous of knowing the reason, and then learned that intrigue,
+court-favour, and "_log-rolling_" to use a quaint American term, made
+members of the academy as well as members of the cabinet. A moment's
+reflection might have told me it could not well be otherwise. It would
+be so in America, if we were burthened with an academy; it is so as
+respects collegiate honours; and what reason is there for supposing it
+should not be so in a country so notoriously addicted to intrigue as
+France?
+
+One ought not to be the dupe of these things. There are a few great
+names, distinguished by common consent, whose claims it is necessary to
+respect. These men form the front of every honorary institution; if
+there are to be knights and nobles, and academicians, they must be of
+the number; not that such distinctions are necessary to them, but that
+they are necessary to the distinctions; after which the _oi polloi_ are
+enrolled as they can find interest. Something very like an admission of
+this is contained in an inscription on the statue of Moliere, which
+stands in the vestibule of the hall of the Academy, which frankly says,
+"Though we are not necessary to your glory, you are necessary to ours."
+He was excluded from the forty, by intrigue, on account of his
+profession being that of a player. Shakspeare, himself, would have fared
+no better. Now, fancy a country in which there was a club of select
+authors, that should refuse to enrol the name of William Shakspeare on
+their list!
+
+The sitting was well attended, and I dare say the addresses were not
+amiss; though there is something exceedingly tiresome in one of these
+eulogies, that is perpetrated by malice prepense. The audience applauded
+very much, after the fashion of those impromptus which are made _a
+loisir_, and I could not but fancy that a good portion of the assembly
+began to think the Academy was what the cockneys call a _rum_ place,
+before they heard the last of it. We had a poem by Comte Daru, to which
+I confess I did not listen, notwithstanding my personal respect for the
+distinguished writer, simply because I was most heartily wearied before
+he began, and because I can never make anything of French poetry, in the
+Academy or out of it.
+
+It would be unjust to speak lightly of any part of the French Academy,
+without a passing remark in honour of those sections of it to which
+honour is due. In these sections may be included, I think, that of the
+arts, as well as that of the sciences. The number of respectable artists
+that exist in this country is perfectly astonishing. The connoisseurs, I
+believe, dispute the merits of the school, and ignorant as I am, in such
+matters, I can myself see that there is a prevalent disposition, both in
+statuary and painting, to sacrifice simplicity to details, and that the
+theatrical is sometimes mistaken for the grand; but, after admitting
+both these faults, and some defects in colouring, there still remains a
+sufficient accumulation of merit, to create wonder in one, like myself,
+who has not had previous opportunities of ascertaining the affluence of
+a great nation in this respect.
+
+As regards the scientific attainments of the French, it is unnecessary
+to say anything; though I believe you will admit that they ought at
+least to have the effect of counteracting some of the prejudices about
+dancing-masters, _petits maitres_, and _perruquiers_, that have
+descended to us, through English novels and plays. Such a man as
+Laplace, alone, is sufficient to redeem an entire people from these
+imputations. The very sight of one of his demonstrations will give
+common men, like ourselves, headaches, and you will remember that having
+successfully got through one of the toughest of them, he felicitated
+himself that there was but one other man living who could comprehend it,
+now it was made.
+
+What a noble gift would it have been to his fellow-creatures, had some
+competent follower of Laplace bestowed on them a comprehensive but
+popular compend of the leading astronomical facts, to be used as one of
+the most ordinary school-books! Apart from the general usefulness of
+this peculiar species of knowledge, and the chances that, by thus
+popularizing the study, sparks might be struck from the spirit of some
+dormant Newton, I know no inquiry that has so strong a tendency to raise
+the mind from the gross and vulgar pursuits of the world, to a
+contemplation of the power and designs of God. It has often happened to
+me, when, filled with wonder and respect for the daring and art of man,
+I have been wandering through the gorgeous halls of some palace, or
+other public edifice, that an orrery or a diagram of the planetary
+system has met my eye, and recalled me, in a moment, from the
+consideration of art, and its intrinsic feebleness, to that of the
+sublimity of nature. At such times, this globe has appeared so
+insignificant, in comparison with the mighty system of which it forms so
+secondary a part, that I felt a truly philosophical indifference, not to
+give it a better term, for all it contained. Admiration of human powers,
+as connected with the objects around me, has been lost in admiration of
+the mysterious spirit which could penetrate the remote and sublime
+secrets of the science; and on no other occasions have I felt so
+profound a conviction of my own isolated insignificance, or so lively a
+perception of the stupendous majesty of the Deity.
+
+Passing by the common and conceded facts of the dimensions of the
+planets, and the extent of their orbits, what thoughts are awakened by
+the suggestion that the fixed stars are the centres of other solar
+systems, and the eccentric comets are links to connect them all in one
+great and harmonious design! The astronomers tell us that some of these
+comets have no visible nucleuses--that the fixed stars are seen through
+their apparent densest parts, and that they can be nothing but luminous
+gases; while, on the other hand, others do betray dark compact bodies of
+more solid matter. Fixed stars unaccountably disappear, as if suddenly
+struck out of their places. Now, we know that aerolites are formed in
+the atmosphere by a natural process, and descend in masses of pure iron.
+Why may not the matter of one globe, dispersed into its elements by the
+fusion of its consummation, reassemble in the shape of comets, gaseous
+at first, and slowly increasing and condensing in the form of solid
+matter, varying in their course as they acquire the property of
+attraction, until they finally settle into new and regular planetary
+orbits by the power of their own masses, thus establishing a regular
+reproduction of worlds to meet the waste of eternity? Were the earth
+dissolved into gases by fusion, what would become of its satellite the
+moon? Might not the principles of our planet, thus volatilized, yield to
+its nearer attraction, assemble around that orb, which, losing its
+governing influence, should be left to wander in infinite space, subject
+to a new but eccentric law of gravity, until finally reduced again
+within the limits of some new system? How know we that such is not the
+origin of comets?
+
+Many astronomers have believed that the solar system, in company with
+thousands of other systems, revolves around a common centre, in orbits
+so vast as to defy computation, and a religious sentiment might well
+suggest that this centre of the universe is the throne of the Most High.
+Here we may fancy the Deity seated in power, and controlling, by his
+will, the movements of worlds, directing each to the completion of his
+own mysterious and benevolent designs.
+
+It certainly might be dangerous to push our speculations too far, but
+there can be no risk in familiarizing men to consider the omnipotence of
+God, and to feel their own comparative insignificance. What ideas of
+vastness are obtained by a knowledge of the fact that there exist stars
+in the firmament which ordinary telescopes show us only as single
+bodies, but which, on examination, by using reflectors of a higher
+power, are found to be clusters of orbs--clusters of worlds--or clusters
+of suns! These, again, are found to be _binary_ stars, or two stars
+revolving round each other, while they are thought, at the same time, to
+revolve around their central sun, and accompanied by this again,
+probably, to revolve round the great common centre of all!
+
+But, in the words of the quaint old song, I must cry "Holla! my fancy,
+whither dost thou go?" Before taking leave of the stars altogether,
+however, I will add that the French, and I believe all Europe, with the
+exception of England, follow the natural order of time, in counting the
+seasons. Thus the spring commences with the vernal equinox, and the
+autumn with the autumnal. This division of the year leaves nearly the
+whole of March as a winter month, June as a spring month, and September
+as belonging to the summer. No general division of the seasons can suit
+all latitudes; but the equinoxes certainly suggest the only two great
+events of the year, that equally affect the entire sphere. Had the old
+method of computing time continued, the seasons would gradually have
+made the circle of the months, until their order was reversed as they
+are now known to be in the northern and southern hemispheres.
+
+Quitting the Academy, which, with its schools of the classical and the
+romantic, has tempted me to a higher flight than I could have believed
+possible, let us descend to the theatres of Paris. Talma was still
+playing last year, when we arrived, and as in the case of repentance, I
+put off a visit to the Theatre Francais, with a full determination to
+go, because it might be made at any time. In the meanwhile, he fell ill
+and died, and it never was my good fortune to see that great actor.
+Mademoiselle Mars I have seen, and, certainly, in her line of
+characters, I have never beheld her equal. Indeed, it is scarcely
+possible to conceive of a purer, more severe, more faultless, and yet
+more poetical representation of common nature, than that which
+characterizes her art. Her acting has all the finish of high breeding,
+with just as much feeling as is necessary to keep alive the illusion. As
+for rant, there is not as much about her whole system, as would serve a
+common English, or American actress, for a single "length."
+
+To be frank with you, so great is the superiority of the French actors,
+in _vaudevilles_, the light opera, and genteel comedy, that I fear I
+have lost my taste for the English stage. Of tragedy I say nothing, for
+I cannot enter into the poetry of the country at all, but, in all below
+it, these people, to my taste, are immeasurably our superiors; and by
+_ours_, you know I include the English stage. The different lines here,
+are divided among the different theatres; so that if you wish to laugh,
+you can go to the Varietes; to weep, to the Theatre Francais; or, to
+gape, to the Odeon. At the Porte St. Martin, one finds vigorous touches
+of national character, and at the Gymnase, the fashionable place of
+resort, just at this moment, national traits polished by convention.
+Besides these, there are many other theatres, not one of which, in its
+way, can be called less than tolerable.
+
+One can say but little in favour of the morals of too many of the pieces
+represented here. In this particular there is a strange obliquity of
+reason, arising out of habitual exaggeration of feeling, that really
+seems to disqualify most of the women, even from perceiving what is
+monstrous, provided it be sentimental and touching. I was particularly
+advised to go to the Theatre Madame to see a certain piece by a
+_coterie_ of very amiable women, whom I met the following night at a
+house where we all regularly resorted, once a week. On entering, they
+eagerly inquired if "I had not been charmed, fascinated; if any thing
+could be better played, or more touching?" Better played it could not
+easily be, but I had been so shocked with the moral of the piece, that I
+could scarcely admire the acting. "The moral! This was the first time
+they had heard it questioned." I was obliged to explain. A certain
+person had been left the protector of a friend's daughter, then an
+infant. He had the child educated as his sister, and she grew to be a
+woman, ignorant of her real origin. In the meantime, she has offers of
+marriage, all of which she unaccountably refuses. In fine, she was
+secretly cherishing a passion for her guardian _and supposed brother_;
+an explanation is had, they marry, and the piece closes. I objected to
+the probability of a well-educated young woman's falling in love with a
+man old enough to be selected as her guardian, when she was an infant,
+and against whom there existed the trifling objection of his being her
+own brother.
+
+"But he was _not_ her brother--not even a relative." "True; but she
+_believed_ him to be her brother." "And nature--do you count nature as
+nothing?--a _secret sentiment_ told her he was not her brother." "And
+use, and education, and an _open sentiment_, and all the world told her
+he was. Such a woman was guilty of a revolting indelicacy and a heinous
+crime, and no exaggerated representation of love, a passion of great
+purity in itself, can ever do away with the shocking realities of such a
+case."
+
+I found no one to agree with me. He was _not_ her brother, and though
+his tongue and all around her told her he was, her heart, that
+infallible guide, told her the truth. What more could any reasonable man
+ask?
+
+It was _a propos_ of this play, and of my objection to this particular
+feature of it, that an exceedingly clever French woman laughingly told
+me she understood there was no such thing as love in America. That a
+people of manners as artificial as the French, should suppose that
+others, under the influence of the cold, formal exterior which the
+puritans have entailed on so large a portion of the public, were without
+strong feeling, is not altogether as irrational as may at first appear.
+Art, in ordinary deportment, is both cause and effect. That which we
+habitually affect to be, gets in the end to be so incorporated with our
+natural propensities as to form a part of the real man. We all know that
+by discipline we can get the mastery of our strongest passions, and, on
+the other hand, by yielding to them and encouraging them, that they soon
+get the mastery over us. Thus do a highly artificial people, fond of,
+and always seeking high excitement, come, in time, to feel it
+artificially, as it were, by natural impulses.
+
+I have mentioned the anecdote of the play, because I think it
+characteristic of a tone of feeling that is quite prevalent among a
+large class of the French, though I am far from saying there is not a
+class who would, at once, see the grave sacrifice of principle that is
+involved, in building up the sentiments of a fiction on such a
+foundation of animal instinct. I find, on recollection, however, that
+Miss Lee, in one of her Canterbury Tales, has made the love of her plot
+hinge on a very similar incident. Surely she must have been under the
+influence of some of the German monstrosities that were so much in
+vogue, about the time she wrote, for even Juvenal would scarcely have
+imagined anything worse, as the subject of his satire.
+
+You will get a better idea of the sentimentalism that more or less
+influences the tables of this country, however, if I tell you that the
+ladies of the _coterie_, in which the remarks on the amorous sister were
+made, once gravely discussed in my presence the question whether Madame
+de Stael was right or wrong, in causing Corinne to go through certain
+sentimental _experiences_, as our canters call it at home, on a clouded
+day, instead of choosing one on which the sun was bright: or, _vice
+versa_; for I really forget whether it was on the "windy side" of
+sensibility or not, that the daughter of Necker was supposed to have
+erred.
+
+The first feeling is that of surprise at finding a people so artificial
+in their ordinary deportment, so chaste and free from exaggeration in
+their scenic representations of life. But reflection will show us that
+all finish has the effect of bringing us within the compass of severe
+laws, and that the high taste which results from cultivation repudiates
+all excess of mere manner. The simple fact is, that an educated
+Frenchman is a great actor all the while, and that when he goes on the
+stage, he has much less to do to be perfect, than an Englishman who has
+drilled himself into coldness, or an American who looks upon strong
+expressions of feeling as affectation. When the two latter commence the
+business of playing assumed parts, they consider it as a new occupation,
+and go at it so much in earnest, that everybody sees they are acting.[19]
+
+[Footnote 19: Mr. Mathews and Mr. Power were the nearest to the neat
+acting of France of any male English performers the writer ever saw. The
+first sometimes permitted himself to be led astray, by the caricatures
+he was required to represent, and by the tastes of his audience; but the
+latter, so far as the writer has seen him, appears determined to be
+chaste, come what, come will.]
+
+You will remember, I say nothing in favour of the French tragic
+representations. When a great and an intellectual nation, like France,
+unites to applaud images and sentiments that are communicated through
+their own peculiar forms of speech, it becomes a stranger to distrust
+his own knowledge, rather than their taste. I dare say that were I more
+accustomed to the language, I might enjoy Corneille and Racine, and even
+Voltaire, for I can now greatly enjoy Moliere; but, to be honest in the
+matter, all reciters of heroic French poetry appear to me to depend on a
+pompous declamation, to compensate for the poverty of the idioms, and
+the want of nobleness in the expressions. I never heard any one, poet or
+actor, he who read his own verses, or he who repeated those of others,
+who did not appear to mouth, and all their tragic playing has had the
+air of being on stilts. Napoleon has said, from the sublime to the
+ridiculous it is but a step. This is much truer in France than in most
+other countries, for the sublime is commonly so sublimated, that it will
+admit of no great increase. Racine, in a most touching scene, makes one
+of his heroic characters offer to wipe off the tears of a heroine lest
+they should discolour her _rouge_! I had a classmate at college, who was
+so very ultra courtly in his language, that he never forgot to say, Mr.
+Julius Caesar, and Mr. Homer.
+
+There exists a perfect mania for letters throughout Europe, in this
+"piping time of peace." Statesmen, soldiers, peers, princes, and kings,
+hardly think themselves _illustrated_, until each has produced his book.
+The world never before saw a tithe of the names of people of condition,
+figuring in the catalogues of its writers. "Some thinks he writes
+Cinna--he owns to Panurge," applies to half the people one meets in
+society. I was at a dinner lately, given by the Marquis de ----, when
+the table was filled with peers, generals, ex-ministers, ex-ambassadors,
+naturalists, philosophers, and statesmen of all degrees. Casting my eyes
+round the circle, I was struck with the singular prevalence of the
+_cacoethes scribendi_, among so many men of different educations,
+antecedents, and pursuits. There was a soldier present who had written
+on taste, a politician on the art of war, a _diplomate_ who had dabbled
+in poetry, and a jurist who pretended to enlighten the world in ethics,
+it was the drollest assemblage in the world, and suggested many queer
+associations, for, I believe, the only man at table, who had not dealt
+in ink, was an old Lieutenant-General, who sat by me, and who, when I
+alluded to the circumstance, strongly felicitated himself that he had
+escaped the mania of the age, as it was an _illustration_ of itself.
+Among the _convives_ were Cuvier, Villemain, Daru, and several others
+who are almost as well known to science and letters.
+
+Half the voluntary visits I receive are preceded by a volume of some
+sort or other, as a token of my new acquaintance being a regularly
+initiated member of the fraternity of the quill. In two or three
+instances, I have been surprised at subsequently discovering that the
+regular profession of the writer is arms, or some other pursuit, in
+which one would scarcely anticipate so strong a devotion to letters. In
+short, such is the actual state of opinion in Europe, that one is hardly
+satisfied with any amount, or any quality of glory, until it is
+consummated by that of having written a book. Napoleon closed his career
+with the quill, and his successor was hardly on his throne, before he
+began to publish. The principal officers of the Empire, and _emigres_
+without number, have fairly set to work as so many disinterested
+historians, and even a lady, who, by way of abbreviation, is called "The
+Widow of the Grand Army," is giving us regularly volumes, whose
+eccentricities and periodicity, as the astronomers say, can be reduced
+to known laws, by the use of figures.
+
+In the middle ages golden spurs were the object of every man's ambition.
+Without them, neither wealth, nor birth, nor power was properly
+esteemed; and, at the present time, passing from the lance to the pen,
+from the casque and shield to the ink-pot and fool's cap, we all seek a
+passport from the order of Letters. Does this augur good or evil, for
+the world? The public press of France is conducted with great spirit and
+talents, on all sides. It has few points in common with our own, beyond
+the mere fact of its general character. In America, a single literary
+man, putting the best face on it, enters into a compact with some person
+of practical knowledge, a printer perhaps, and together they establish a
+newspaper, the mechanical part of which is confided to the care of the
+latter partner, and the intellectual to the former. In the country, half
+the time, the editor is no other than the printer himself, the division
+of labour not having yet reached even this important branch of industry.
+But looking to the papers that are published in the towns, one man of
+letters is a luxury about an American print. There are a few instances
+in which there are two, or three; but, generally, the subordinates are
+little more than scissors-men. Now, it must be apparent, at a glance,
+that no one individual can keep up the character of a daily print, of
+any magnitude; the drain on his knowledge and other resources being too
+great. This, I take it, is the simple reason why the press of America
+ranks no higher than it does. The business is too much divided; too much
+is required, and this, too, in a country where matters of grave import
+are of rare occurrence, and in which the chief interests are centred in
+the vulgar concerns of mere party politics, with little or no connexion
+with great measures, or great principles. You have only to fancy the
+superior importance that attaches to the views of powerful monarchs, the
+secret intrigues of courts, on whose results, perhaps, depend the
+fortunes of Christendom, and the serious and radical principles that are
+dependent on the great changes of systems that are silently working
+their way, in this part of the world, and which involve material
+alterations in the very structure of society, to get an idea of how much
+more interest a European journal, _ceteris paribus_, must be, compared
+to an American journal, by the nature of its facts alone. It is true
+that we get a portion of these facts, as light finally arrives from the
+remoter stars, but mutilated, and necessarily shorn of much of their
+interest, by their want of importance to our own country. I had been in
+Europe some time, before I could fully comprehend the reason why I was
+ignorant of so many minor points of its political history, for, from
+boyhood up, I had been an attentive reader of all that touched this part
+of the world, as it appeared in our prints. By dint of inquiry, however,
+I believe I have come at the fact. The winds are by no means as regular
+as the daily prints; and it frequently happens, especially in the winter
+and spring months, that five or six packets arrive nearly together,
+bringing with them the condensed intelligence of as many weeks. Now,
+newspaper finders notoriously seek the latest news, and in the hurry and
+confusion of reading and selecting, and bringing out, to meet the wants
+of the day, many of the connecting links are lost, readers get imperfect
+notions of men and things, and, from a want of a complete understanding
+of the matter, the mind gives up, without regret, the little and
+unsatisfactory knowledge it had so casually obtained. I take it, this is
+a principal cause of the many false notions that exist among us, on the
+subject of Europe and its events.
+
+In France, a paper is established by a regular subscription of capital;
+a principal editor is selected, and he is commonly supported, in the
+case of a leading journal, by four or five paid assistants. In addition
+to this formidable corps, many of the most distinguished men of France
+are known to contribute freely to the columns of the prints in the
+interest of their cause.
+
+The laws of France compel a journal that has admitted any statement
+involving facts concerning an individual, to publish his reply, that the
+antidote may meet the poison. This is a regulation that we might adopt
+with great advantage to truth and the character of the country.
+
+There is not at this moment, within my knowledge, a single critical
+literary journal of received authority in all France. This is a species
+of literature to which the French pay but little attention just now,
+although many of the leading daily prints contain articles on the
+principal works as they appear.
+
+By the little that has come under my observation, I should say the
+fraudulent and disgusting system of puffing and of abusing, as interest
+or pique dictates, is even carried to a greater length in France than it
+is in either England or America. The following anecdote, which relates
+to myself, may give you some notion of the _modus operandi_.
+
+All the works I had written previously to coming to Europe had been
+taken from the English editions and translated, appearing simultaneously
+with their originals. Having an intention to cause a new book to be
+printed in English in Paris, for the sake of reading the proofs, the
+necessity was felt of getting some control over the translation, lest,
+profiting by the interval necessary to send the sheets home to be
+reprinted, it might appear as the original book. I knew that the sheets
+of previous books had been purchased in England, and I accordingly sent
+a proposition to the publishers that the next bargain should be made
+with me. Under the impression that an author's price would be asked,
+they took the alarm, and made difficulties. Finding me firm, and
+indisposed to yield to some threats of doing as they pleased, the matter
+was suspended for a few days. Just at this moment, I received through
+the post a single number of an obscure newspaper, whose existence, until
+then, was quite unknown to me. Surprised at such an attention, I was
+curious to know the contents. The journal contained an article on my
+merits and demerits as a writer, the latter being treated with a good
+deal of freedom. When one gets a paper in this manner, containing abuse
+of himself, he is pretty safe in believing its opinions dishonest. But I
+had even better evidence than common in this particular case, for I
+happened to be extolled for the manner in which I had treated the
+character of Franklin, a personage whose name even had never appeared in
+anything I had written. This, of course, settled the character of the
+critique, and the next time I saw the individual who had acted as agent
+in the negociation just mentioned, I gave him the paper, and told him I
+was half disposed to raise my price on account of the pitiful manoeuvre
+it contained. We had already come to terms, the publishers finding that
+the price was little more than nominal, and the answer was a virtual
+conclusion that the article was intended to affect my estimate of the
+value of the intended work in France, and to bring me under subjection
+to the critics.[20]
+
+[Footnote 20: The writer suffers this anecdote to stand as it was written
+nine years since; but since his return home, he has discovered that we
+are in no degree behind the French in the corruption and frauds that
+render the pursuits of a writer one of the most humiliating and
+revolting in which a man of any pride of character can engage, unless he
+resolutely maintains his independence, a temerity that is certain to be
+resented by all those who, unequal to going alone in the paths of
+literature, seek their ends by clinging to those who can, either as
+pirates or robbers.]
+
+I apprehend that few books are brought before the public in France,
+dependent only on their intrinsic merits; and the system of intrigue,
+which predominates in everything, is as active in this as in other
+interests.
+
+In France, a book that penetrates to the provinces may be said to be
+popular; and as for a book coming _from_ the provinces, it is almost
+unheard of. The despotism of the trade on this point is unyielding.
+Paris appears to deem itself the arbiter in all matters of taste and
+literature, and it is almost as unlikely that a new fashion should come
+from Lyon, or Bordeaux, or Marseilles, as that a new work should be
+received with favour that was published in either of those towns. The
+approbation of Paris is indispensable, and the publishers of the
+capital, assisted by their paid corps of puffers and detractors, are
+sufficiently powerful to prevent that potent public, to whom all affect
+to defer, from judging for itself.
+
+We have lately had a proof here of the unwillingness of the Parisians to
+permit others to decide for them, in anything relating to taste, in a
+case that refers to us Americans. Madame Malibran arrived from America a
+few months since. In Europe she was unknown, but the great name of her
+father stood in her stead. Unluckily it was whispered that she had met
+with great success in America. America! and this, too, in conjunction
+with music and the opera! The poor woman was compelled to appear under
+the disadvantage of having brought an American reputation with her, and
+seriously this single fact went nigh to destroy her fortunes. Those
+wretches who, as Coleridge expresses it, are "animalculae, who live by
+feeding on the body of genius," affected to be displeased, and the
+public hesitated, at their suggestions, about accepting an artist from
+the "colonies," as they still have the audacity to call the great
+Republic. I have no means of knowing what sacrifices were made to the
+petty tyrants of the press before this woman, who has the talents
+necessary to raise her to the summit of her profession, was enabled to
+gain the favour of a "_generous and discerning public!_"
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XVI.
+
+Environs of Paris.--Village of St. Ouen.--Our House there.--Life on the
+River.--Parisian Cockneys.--A pretty Grisette.--Voyage across the Seine.
+--A rash Adventurer.--Village Fete.--Montmorency.--View near Paris.
+
+
+TO JAMES STEVENSON, ESQUIRE, ALBANY.
+
+We have been the residents of a French village ever since the 1st of
+June, and it is now drawing to the close of October. We had already
+passed the greater part of a summer, and entire autumn, winter and
+spring, within the walls of Paris, and then we thought we might indulge
+our tastes a little, by retreating to the fields, to catch a glimpse of
+country life. You will smile when I add that we are only a league from
+the Barriere de Clichy. This is the reason I have not before spoken of
+the removal, for we are in town three or four times every week, and
+never miss an occasion, when there is anything to be seen. I shall now
+proceed, however, to let you into the secret of our actual situation.
+
+I passed the month of May examining the environs of the capital in quest
+of an house. As this was an agreeable occupation, we were in no hurry;
+but having set up my cabriolet, we killed two birds with one stone, by
+making ourselves familiarly acquainted with nearly every village or
+hamlet within three leagues of Paris, a distance beyond which I did not
+wish to go.
+
+On the side of St. Cloud, which embraces Passy, Auteuil, and all the
+places that encircle the Bois de Boulogne, the Hyde Park of Paris, there
+are very many pleasant residences, but from one cause or another, no one
+suited us exactly, and we finally took a house in the village of St.
+Ouen, the Runnymeade of France. When Louis XVIII. came, in 1814, to his
+capital, in the rear of the allies, he stopped for a few days at St.
+Ouen, a league from the barriers, where there was a small chateau that
+was the property of the crown. Here he was met by M. de Talleyrand and
+others, and hence he issued the celebrated charter, that is to render
+France for evermore a constitutional country.
+
+The chateau has since been razed, and a pavilion erected in its place,
+which has been presented to the Comtesse de ----, a lady who, reversing
+the ordinary lot of courtiers, is said to cause majesty to live in the
+sunshine of _her_ smiles. What an appropriate and encouraging monument
+to rear on the birth-place of French liberty! At the opposite extremity
+of the village is another considerable house, that was once the dwelling
+of M. Necker, and is now the property and country residence of M.
+Ternaux, or the _Baron_ Ternaux, if it were polite to style him thus,
+the most celebrated manufacturer of France. I say polite, for the mere
+_fanfaronnade_ of nobility is little in vogue here. The wags tell a
+story of some one, who was formally announced as "Monsieur le Marquis
+d'un tel," turning short round on the servant, and exclaiming with
+indignation, "Marquis toi-meme!" But this story savours of the
+Bonapartists; for as the Emperor created neither _marquis_ nor
+_vicomtes_, there was a sort of affectation of assuming these titles at
+the restoration as proofs of belonging to the old _regime_.
+
+St. Ouen is a cluster of small, mean, stone houses, stretched along the
+right bank of the Seine, which, after making a circuit of near twenty
+miles, winds round so close to the town again, that they are actually
+constructing a basin, near the village, for the use of the capital; it
+being easier to wheel articles from this point to Paris, than to contend
+with the current and to tread its shoals. In addition to the two houses
+named, however, it has six or eight respectable abodes between the
+street and the river, one of which is our own.
+
+This place became a princely residence about the year 1800, since which
+time it has been more or less frequented as such down to the 4th June,
+1814, the date of the memorable charter.[21] Madame de Pompadour
+possessed the chateau in 1745, so you see it has been "dust to dust"
+with this place, as with all that is frail.
+
+[Footnote 21: The chateau of St. Ouen, rather less than two centuries
+since, passed into the possession of the Duc de Gesvre. Dulaure gives
+the following,--a part of a letter from this nobleman,--as a specimen of
+the education of a _duc_ in the seventeenth century:--"Monsieur, me
+trouvant oblige de randre une bonne party de largan que mais enfant ont
+pris de peuis qu'il sont au campane, monsieur, cela moblige a vous
+suplier tres humblemant monsieur de me faire la grasse de commander
+monsieur quant il vous plera que lon me pay la capitenery de Monsaux
+monsieur vous asseurant que vous mobligeres fort sansiblement monsieur
+comme ausy de me croire avec toute sorte de respec, etc." This beats
+Jack Cade out and out. The great connetable Anne de Montmorency could
+not write his name, and as his signature became necessary, his secretary
+stood over his shoulder to tell him when he had made enough _pies de
+mouche_ to answer the purpose.]
+
+The village of St. Ouen, small, dirty, crowded and unsavoury as it is,
+has a _place_, like every other French village. When we drove into it,
+to look at the house, I confess to having laughed outright, at the idea
+of inhabiting such a hole. Two large _portes-cocheres_, however, opened
+from the square, and we were admitted, through the best-looking of the
+two, into a spacious and an extremely neat court. On one side of the
+gate was a lodge for a porter, and on the other, a building to contain
+gardeners' tools, plants, etc. The walls that separate it from the square
+and the adjoining gardens are twelve or fourteen feet high, and once
+within them, the world is completely excluded. The width of the grounds
+does not exceed a hundred and fifty feet; the length, the form being
+that of a parallelogram, may be three hundred, or a little more; and yet
+in these narrow limits, which are planted _a l'Anglaise_, so well is
+everything contrived, that we appear to have abundance of room. The
+garden terminates in a terrace that overhangs the river, and, from this
+point, the eye ranges over a wide extent of beautiful plain, that is
+bounded by fine bold hills which are teeming with gray villages and
+_bourgs_.
+
+The house is of stone, and not without elegance. It may be ninety feet
+in length, by some forty in width. The entrance is into a vestibule,
+which has the offices on the right, and the great staircase on the left.
+The principal _salon_ is in front. This is a good room, near thirty feet
+long, fifteen or sixteen high, and has three good windows, that open on
+the garden. The billiard-room communicates on one side, and the _salle a
+manger_ on the other; next the latter come the offices again, and next
+the billiard-room is a very pretty little boudoir. Up stairs, are suites
+of bed-rooms and dressing-rooms; every thing is neat, and the house is
+in excellent order, and well furnished for a country residence. Now, all
+this I get at a hundred dollars a month, for the five summer months.
+There are also a carriage-house, and stabling for three horses. The
+gardener and porter are paid by the proprietor. The village, however, is
+not in much request, and the rent is thought to be low.
+
+Among the great advantages enjoyed by a residence in Europe, are the
+facilities of this nature. Furnished apartments, or furnished houses,
+can be had in almost every town of any size; and, owning your own linen
+and plate, nearly every other necessary is found you. It is true, that
+one sometimes misses comforts to which he has been accustomed in his own
+house; but, in France, many little things are found, it is not usual to
+meet with elsewhere. Thus, no principal bedroom is considered properly
+furnished in a good house, without a handsome secretary, and a bureau.
+These two articles are as much matters of course, as are the eternal two
+rooms and folding doors, in New York.
+
+This, then, has been our Tusculum since June. M. Ternaux enlivens the
+scene, occasionally, by a dinner; and he has politely granted us
+permission to walk in his grounds, which are extensive and well laid
+out, for the old French style. We have a neighbour on our left, name
+unknown, who gives suppers in his garden, and concerts that really are
+worthy of the grand opera. Occasionally, we get a song, in a female
+voice, that rivals the best of Madame Malibran's. On our right lives a
+staid widow, whose establishment is as tranquil as our own.
+
+One of our great amusements is to watch the _living_ life on the river,
+--there is no _still_ life in France. All the washerwomen of the village
+assemble, three days in the week, beneath our terrace, and a merrier set
+of _grisettes_ is not to be found in the neighbourhood of Paris. They
+chat, and joke, and splash, and scream from morning to night, lightening
+the toil by never-ceasing good humour. Occasionally an enormous
+scow-like barge is hauled up against the current, by stout horses,
+loaded to the water's edge, or one, without freight, comes dropping down
+the stream, nearly filling the whole river as it floats broad-side to.
+There are three or four islands opposite, and, now and then, a small
+boat is seen paddling among them. We have even tried _punting_
+ourselves, but the amusement was soon exhausted.
+
+Sunday is a great day with us, for then the shore is lined with
+Parisians, as thoroughly cockney as if Bow-bells could be heard in the
+Quartier Montmartre! These good people visit us, in all sorts of ways;
+some on donkeys, some in cabriolets, some in fiacres, and by far the
+larger portion on foot. They are perfectly inoffensive and unobtrusive,
+being, in this respect, just as unlike an American inroad from a town as
+can well be. These crowds pass vineyards on their way to us, unprotected
+by any fences. This point in the French character, however, about which
+so much has been said to our disadvantage, as well as to that of the
+English, is subject to some explanation. The statues, promenades,
+gardens, etc. etc. are, almost without exception, guarded by sentinels;
+and then there are agents of the police, in common clothes, scattered
+through the towns, in such numbers as to make depredations hazardous. In
+the country each _commune_ has one, or more, _gardes champetres_, whose
+sole business it is to detect and arrest trespassers. When to these are
+added the _gendarmes a pied_ and _a cheval_, who are constantly in
+motion, one sees that the risk of breaking the laws is attended with
+more hazard here than with us. There is no doubt, on the other hand,
+that the training and habits, produced by such a system of watchfulness,
+enter so far into the character of the people, that they cease to think
+of doing that which is so strenuously denied them.
+
+Some of our visitors make their appearance in a very quaint style. I met
+a party the other day, among whom the following family arrangement had
+obtained:--The man was mounted on a donkey, with his feet just clear of
+the ground. The wife, a buxom brunette, was trudging afoot in the rear,
+accompanied by the two younger children, a boy and girl, between twelve
+and fourteen, led by a small dog, fastened to a string like the guide of
+a blind mendicant; while the eldest daughter was mounted on the crupper,
+maintaining her equilibrium by a masculine disposition of her lower
+limbs. She was a fine, rosy-cheeked _grisette_, of about seventeen; and,
+as they ambled along, just fast enough to keep the cur on a slow trot,
+her cap flared in the wind, her black eyes flashed with pleasure, and
+her dark ringlets streamed behind her, like so many silken pennants. She
+had a ready laugh for every one she met, and a sort of malicious
+pleasure in asking, by her countenance, if they did not wish they too
+had a donkey? As the seat was none of the most commodious, she had
+contrived to make a pair of stirrups of her petticoats. The gown was
+pinned up about her waist, leaving her knees, instead of her feet, as
+the _points d'appui_. The well-turned legs, and the ankles, with such a
+_chaussure_ as at once marks a Parisienne, were exposed to the
+admiration of a _parterre_ of some hundreds of idle wayfarers. Truly, it
+is no wonder that sculptors abound in this country, for capital models
+are to be found, even in the highways. The donkey was the only one who
+appeared displeased with this _monture_, and he only manifested
+dissatisfaction by lifting his hinder extremities a little, as the man
+occasionally touched his flanks with a nettle, that the ass would much
+rather have been eating.
+
+Not long since I passed half an hour on the terrace, an amused witness
+of the perils of a voyage across the Seine in a punt. The adventurers
+were a _bourgeois_, his wife, sister, and child. Honest Pierre, the
+waterman, had conditioned to take the whole party to the island opposite
+and to return them safe to the main for the modicum of five sous. The
+old fox invariably charged me a franc for the same service. There was
+much demurring, and many doubts about encountering the risk; and more
+than once the women would have receded, had not the man treated the
+matter as a trifle. He affirmed _parole d'honneur_ that his father had
+crossed the Maine a dozen times, and no harm had come of it! This
+encouraged them, and, with many pretty screams, _mes fois_, and _oh,
+Dieu_, they finally embarked. The punt was a narrow scow that a ton
+weight would not have disturbed, the river was so low and sluggish that
+it might have been forded two-thirds of the distance, and the width was
+not three hundred feet. Pierre protested that the danger was certainly
+not worth mentioning, and away he went, as philosophical in appearance
+as his punt. The voyage was made in safety, and the bows of the boat had
+actually touched the shore on its return, before any of the passengers
+ventured to smile. The excursion, like most travelling, was likely to be
+most productive of happiness by the recollections. But the women were no
+sooner landed, than that rash adventurer, the husband, brother, and
+father, seized an oar, and began to ply it with all his force. He merely
+wished to tell his _confreres_ of the Rue Montmartre how a punt might be
+rowed. Pierre had gallantly landed to assist the ladies, and the boat,
+relieved of its weight, slowly yielded to the impulse of the oar, and
+inclined its bows from the land. "Oh! Edouard! mon mari! mon frere!--que
+fais-tu?" exclaimed the ladies. "Ce n'est rien," returned the man,
+puffing, and giving another lusty sweep, by which he succeeded in
+forcing the punt fully twenty feet from the shore. "Edouard! cher
+Edouard!" "Laisse-moi m'amuser,--je m'amuse, je m'amuse," cried the
+husband in a tone of indignant remonstrance. But Edouard, a tight, sleek
+little _epicier_, of about five-and-thirty, had never heard that an oar
+on each side was necessary in a boat, and the harder he pulled the less
+likely was he to regain the shore. Of this he began to be convinced, as
+he whirled more into the centre of the current; and his efforts now
+really became frantic, for his imagination probably painted the horrors
+of a distant voyage in an unknown bark to an unknown land, and all
+without food or compass. The women screamed, and the louder they cried,
+the more strenuously he persevered in saying, "Laisse-moi m'amuser--je
+m'amuse, je m'amuse." By this time the perspiration poured from the face
+of Edouard, and I called to the imperturbable Pierre, who stood in
+silent admiration of his punt while playing such antics, and desired him
+to tell the man to put his oar on the bottom, and to push the boat
+ashore. "Oui, Monsieur," said the rogue, with a leer, for he remembered
+the francs, and we soon had our adventurer safe on _terra firma_ again.
+Then began the tender expostulations, the affectionate reproaches, and
+the kind injunctions for the truant to remember that he was a husband
+and a father. Edouard, secretly cursing the punt and all rivers in his
+heart, made light of the matter, however, protesting to the last that he
+had only been enjoying himself.
+
+We have had a fete too; for every village in the vicinity of Paris has
+its fete. The square was filled with whirligigs and flying-horses, and
+all the ingenious contrivances of the French to make and to spend a sou
+pleasantly. There was service in the parish church, at which our
+neighbours sang in a style fit for St. Peter's, and the villagers danced
+quadrilles on the green with an air that would be thought fine in many a
+country drawing-room.
+
+I enjoy all this greatly; for, to own the truth, the crowds and mannered
+sameness of Paris began to weary me. Our friends occasionally come from
+town to see us, and we make good use of the cabriolet. As we are near
+neighbours to St. Denis, we have paid several visits to the tombs of the
+French kings, and returned each time less pleased with most of the
+unmeaning obsequies that are observed in their vaults. There was a
+ceremony, not long since, at which the royal family and many of the
+great officers of the court assisted, and among others M. de Talleyrand.
+The latter was in the body of the church, when a man rushed upon him and
+actually struck him, or shoved him to the earth, using at the same time
+language that left no doubt of the nature of the assault. There are
+strange rumours connected with the affair. The assailant was a Marquis
+de ----, and it is reported that his wrongs, real or imaginary, are
+connected with a plot to rob one of the dethroned family of her jewels,
+or of some crown jewels, I cannot say which, at the epoch of the
+restoration. The journals said a good deal about it at the time, but
+events occur so fast here that a quarrel of this sort produces little
+sensation. I pretend to no knowledge of the merits of this affair, and
+only give a general outline of what was current in the public prints at
+the time.
+
+We have also visited Enghien, and Montmorency. The latter, as you know
+already, stands on the side of a low mountain, in plain view of Paris.
+It is a town of some size, with very uneven streets, some of them being
+actually sharp acclivities, and a Gothic church that is seen from afar
+and that is well worth viewing near by. These quaint edifices afford us
+deep delight, by their antiquity, architecture, size, and pious
+histories. What matters it to us how much or how little superstition may
+blend with the rites, when we know and feel that we are standing in a
+nave that has echoed with orisons to God, for a thousand years! This of
+Montmorency is not quite so old, however, having been rebuilt only three
+centuries since.
+
+Dulaure, a severe judge of aristocracy, denounces the pretension of the
+Montmorencies to be the _Premiers Barons Chretiens_, affirming that they
+were neither the first barons, nor the first Christians, by a great
+many. He says, that the extravagant title has most probably been a
+war-cry, in the time of the crusaders. According to his account of the
+family it originated, about the year 1008, in a certain Borchard, who,
+proving a bad neighbour to the Abbey of St. Denis, the vassals of which
+he was in the habit of robbing, besides, now and then, despoiling a
+monk, the king caused his fortress in the Isle St. Denis to be razed;
+after which, by a treaty, he was put in possession of the mountain hard
+by, with permission to erect another hold near a fountain, at a place
+called in the charters, Montmorenciacum. Hence the name, and the family.
+This writer thinks that the first castle must have been built of wood!
+
+We took a road that led us up to a bluff on the mountain, behind the
+town, where we obtained a new and very peculiar view of Paris and its
+environs. I have said that the French towns have no straggling suburbs.
+A few winehouses (to save the _octroi_) are built near the gates,
+compactly, as in the town itself, and there the buildings cease as
+suddenly as if pared down by a knife. The fields touch the walls, in
+many places, and between St. Ouen and the guinguettes and winehouses, at
+the Barriere de Clichy, a distance of two miles, there is but a solitary
+building. A wide plain separates Paris, on this side, from the
+mountains, and of course our view extended across it. The number of
+villages was absolutely astounding. Although I did not attempt counting
+them, I should think not fewer than a hundred were in sight, all grey,
+picturesque, and clustering round the high nave and church tower, like
+chickens gathering beneath the wing. The day was clouded, and the
+hamlets rose from their beds of verdure, sombre but distinct, with their
+faces of wall, now in subdued light, and now quite shaded, resembling
+the glorious _darks_ of Rembrandt's pictures.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XVII.
+
+Rural Drives.--French Peasantry.--View of Montmartre.--The Boulevards.
+--The Abattoirs.--Search for Lodgings.--A queer Breakfast.--Royal
+Progresses and Magnificence.--French Carriages and Horses.--Modes of
+Conveyance.--Drunkenness.--French Criminal Justice.--Marvellous Stories
+of the Police.
+
+
+To CAPT. M. PERRY, U.S.N.
+
+I am often in the saddle since our removal to St. Ouen. I first
+commenced the business of exploring in the cabriolet, with my wife for a
+companion, during which time, several very pretty drives, of whose
+existence one journeying along the great roads would form no idea, were
+discovered. At last, as these became exhausted, I mounted, and pricked
+into the fields. The result has been a better knowledge of the details
+of ordinary rural life, in this country, than a stranger would get by a
+residence, after the ordinary fashion, of years.
+
+I found the vast plain intersected by roads as intricate as the veins of
+the human body. The comparison is not unapt, by the way, and may be even
+carried out much further; for the _grandes routes_ can be compared to
+the arteries, the _chemins vicinaux_, or cross-roads, to the veins, and
+the innumerable paths that intersect the fields, in all directions, to
+the more minute blood-vessels, circulation being the object common to
+all.
+
+I mount my horse and gallop into the fields at random, merely taking
+care not to quit the paths. By the latter, one can go in almost any
+direction; and as they are very winding there is a certain pleasure in
+following their sinuosities, doubtful whither they tend. Much of the
+plain is in vegetables, for the use of Paris; though there is
+occasionally a vineyard, or a field of grain. The weather has become
+settled and autumnal, and is equally without the chilling moisture of
+the winter, or the fickleness of the spring. The kind-hearted peasants
+see me pass among them without distrust, and my salutations are answered
+with cheerfulness and civility. Even at this trifling distance from the
+capital, I miss the brusque ferocity that is so apt to characterise the
+deportment of its lower classes, who are truly the people that Voltaire
+has described as "ou singes, ou tigres." Nothing, I think, strikes an
+American more than the marked difference between the town and country of
+France. With us, the towns are less town-like, and the country less
+country-like, than is usually the case. Our towns are provincial from
+the want of tone that can only be acquired by time, while it is a fault
+with our country to wish to imitate the towns. I now allude to habits
+only, for nature at home, owing to the great abundance of wood, is more
+strikingly rural than in any other country I know. The inhabitant of
+Paris can quit his own door in the centre of the place, and after
+walking an hour he finds himself truly in the country, both as to the
+air of external objects, and as to the manners of the people. The
+influence of the capital doubtless has some little effect on the latter,
+but not enough to raise them above the ordinary rusticity, for the
+French peasants are as rustic in their appearance and habits as the
+upper classes are refined.
+
+One of my rides is through the plain that lies between St. Ouen and
+Montmartre, ascending the latter by its rear to the windmills that,
+night and day, are whirling their ragged arms over the capital of
+France. Thence I descend into the town by the carriage road. A view from
+this height is like a glimpse into the pages of history; for every foot
+of land that it commands, and more than half the artificial accessories,
+are pregnant of the past. Looking down into the fissures between the
+houses, men appear the mites they are; and one gets to have a
+philosophical indifference to human vanities by obtaining these
+bird's-eye views of them in the mass. It was a happy thought that first
+suggested the summits of mountains for religious contemplation; nor do I
+think the father of evil discovered his usual sagacity when he resorted
+to such a place for the purposes of selfish temptation: perhaps,
+however, it would be better to say, he betrayed the grovelling
+propensities of his own nature. The cathedral of Notre Dame should have
+been reared on this noble and isolated height, that the airs of heaven
+might whisper through its fane, breathing the chaunts in honour of God.
+
+Dismounting manfully, I have lately undertaken a far more serious
+enterprise--that of making the entire circuit of Paris on foot. My
+companion was our old friend Captain ----. We met by appointment at
+eleven o'clock, just without the Barriere de Clichy, and ordering the
+carriage to come for us at five, off we started, taking the direction of
+the eastern side of the town. You probably know that what are commonly
+called the _boulevards_ of Paris, are no more than a circular line of
+wide streets through the very heart of the place, which obtain their
+common appellation from the fact that they occupy the sites of the
+ancient walls. Thus the street within this circuit is called by its
+name, whatever it may happen to be, and if continued without the
+circuit, the term of _faubourg_ or suburb is added; as in the case of
+the Rue St. Honore and the Rue du Faubourg St. Honore, the latter being
+strictly a continuation of the former, but lying without the site of the
+ancient walls. As the town has increased, it has been found necessary to
+enlarge its _enceinte_, and the walls are now encircled with wide
+avenues that are called the outer _boulevards_. There are avenues within
+and without the walls, and immediately beneath them; and in many places
+both are planted. Our route was on the exterior.
+
+We began the march in good spirits, and by twelve we had handsomely done
+our four miles and a half. Of course we passed the different
+_barrieres_, and the gate of Pere Lachaise. The captain commenced with
+great vigour, and for near two hours, as he expressed himself, he had me
+a little on his lee quarter; not more, however, he thought, than was due
+to his superior rank, for he had once been my senior as a midshipman. At
+the Barriere du Trone we were compelled to diverge a little from the
+wall, in order to get across the river by the Pont d'Austerlitz. By this
+time I had ranged up abeam of the commodore, and I proposed that we
+should follow the river up as far as the wall again, in order to do our
+work honestly; but to this he objected that he had no wish to puzzle
+himself with spherical trigonometry; that plane sailing was his humour
+at the moment; and that he had, moreover, just discovered that one of
+his boots pinched his foot. Accordingly we proceeded straight from the
+bridge, not meeting the wall again until we were beyond the _abattoir_.
+These _abattoirs_ are slaughter-houses, that Napoleon caused to be built
+near the walls, in some places within, and in others without them,
+according to the different localities. There are five or six of them,
+that of Montmartre being the most considerable. They are kept in
+excellent order, and the regulations respecting them appear to be
+generally good. The butchers sell their meats, in shops, all over the
+town, a general custom in Europe, and one that has more advantages than
+disadvantages, as it enables the inhabitant to order a meal at any
+moment. This independence in the mode of living distinguishes all the
+large towns of this part of the world from our own; for I greatly
+question if there be any civilized people among whom the individual is
+as much obliged to consult the habits and tastes of _all_, in gratifying
+his own, as in free and independent America. A part of this
+uncomfortable feature in our domestic economy is no doubt the result of
+circumstances unavoidably connected with the condition of a young
+country; but a great deal is to be ascribed to the practice of referring
+everything to the public, and not a little to those religious sects who
+extended their supervision to all the affairs of life, that had a chief
+concern in settling the country, and who have entailed so much that is
+inconvenient and ungraceful (I might almost say, in some instances,
+_disgraceful_) on the nation, blended with so much that forms its purest
+sources of pride. Men are always an inconsistent medley of good and bad.
+
+The captain and myself had visited the _abattoir_ of Montmartre only a
+few days previously to this excursion, and we had both been much
+gratified with its order and neatness. But an unfortunate pile of hocks,
+hoofs, tallow, and nameless fragments of carcasses, had caught my
+companion's eye. I found him musing over this _omnium gatherum_, which
+he protested was worse than a bread-pudding at Saratoga. By some process
+of reasoning that was rather material than philosophical, he came to the
+conclusion that the substratum of all the extraordinary compounds he had
+met with at the _restaurans_ was derived from this pile, and he swore as
+terribly as any of "our army in Flanders," that not another mouthful
+would he touch, while he remained in Paris, if the dish put his
+knowledge of natural history at fault. He had all along suspected he had
+been eating cats and vermin, but his imagination had never pictured to
+him such a store of abominations for the _casserole_ as were to be seen
+in this pile. In vain I asked him if he did not find the dishes good.
+Cats might be good for anything he knew, but he was too old to change
+his habits. On the present occasion, he made the situation of the
+Abattoir d'Ivry an excuse for not turning up the river by the wall. I do
+not think, however, we gained anything in the distance, the _detour_ to
+cross the bridge more than equalling the ground we missed.
+
+We came under the wall again at the Barriere de Ville Juif, and followed
+it, keeping on the side next the town until we fairly reached the river
+once more, beyond Vaugirard. Here we were compelled to walk some
+distance to cross the Pont de Jena, and again to make a considerable
+circuit through Passy, on account of the gardens, in order to do justice
+to our task. About this time the commodore fairly fell astern; and he
+discovered that the other boot was too large. I kept talking to him over
+my shoulder, and cheering him on, and he felicitated me on frogs
+agreeing so well with my constitution. At length we came in at the
+Barriere de Clichy, just as the clocks struck three, or in four hours,
+to a minute, from the time we had left the same spot. We had neither
+stopped, eaten, nor drunk a mouthful. The distance is supposed to be
+about eighteen miles, but I can hardly think it is so much, for we went
+rather further than if we had closely followed the wall.
+
+Our agility having greatly exceeded my calculations, we were obliged to
+walk two miles further, in order to find the carriage. The time expended
+in going this distance included, we were just four hours and a half on
+our feet. The captain protested that his boots had disgraced him, and
+forthwith commanded another pair; a subterfuge that did him no good.
+
+One anecdote connected with the sojourn of this eccentric, but really
+excellent-hearted and intelligent man,[22] at Paris is too good not to be
+told. He cannot speak a word of pure French; and of all Anglicizing of
+the language I have ever heard, his attempts at it are the most droll.
+He calls the Tuileries, Tully_rees_; the Jardin des Plantes, the _Garden
+dis Plants_; the guillotine, gully_teen_; and the _garcons_ of the
+_cafes_, _gassons_. Choleric, with whiskers like a bear, and a voice of
+thunder, if anything goes wrong, he swears away, starboard and larboard,
+in French and English, in delightful discord.
+
+[Footnote 22: He is since dead.]
+
+He sought me out soon after his arrival, and carried me with him, as an
+interpreter, in quest of lodgings. We found a very snug little apartment
+of four rooms, that he took. The last occupant was a lady, who, in
+letting the rooms, conditioned that Marie, her servant, must be hired
+with them, to look after the furniture, and to be in readiness to
+receive her at her return from the provinces. A few days after this
+arrangement I called, and was surprised, on ringing the bell, to hear
+the cry of an infant. After a moment's delay the door was cautiously
+opened, and the captain, in his gruffest tone, demanded, "Cur vully
+voo?" An exclamation of surprise at seeing me followed; but instead of
+opening the door for my admission, he held it for a moment, as if
+undecided whether to be "at home" or not. At this critical instant an
+infant cried again, and the thing became too ridiculous for further
+gravity. We both laughed outright. I entered, and found the captain with
+a child three days old tucked under his right arm, or that which had
+been concealed by the door. The explanation was very simple, and
+infinitely to his credit.
+
+Marie, the _locum tenens_ of the lady who had let the apartment, and the
+wife of a coachman who was in the country, was the mother of the infant.
+After its birth she presented herself to her new master; told her story;
+adding, by means of an interpreter, that if he turned her away, she had
+no place in which to lay her head. The kind-hearted fellow made out to
+live abroad as well as he could for a day or two--an easy thing enough
+in Paris, by the way,--and when I so unexpectedly entered, Marie was
+actually cooking the captain's breakfast in the kitchen while he was
+nursing the child in the _salon!_
+
+The dialogues between the captain and Marie were to the last degree
+amusing. He was quite unconscious of the odd sounds he uttered in
+speaking French, but thought he was getting on very well, being rather
+minute and particular in his orders; and she felt his kindness to
+herself and child so sensibly, that she always fancied she understood
+his wishes. I was frequently compelled to interpret between them; first
+asking him to explain himself in English, for I could make but little of
+his French myself. On one occasion he invited me to breakfast, as we
+were to pass the day exploring in company. By way of inducement, he told
+me that he had accidentally found some cocoa in the shell, and that he
+had been teaching Marie how to cook it "ship-fashion." I would not
+promise, as his hour was rather early, and the distance between us so
+great; but before eleven I would certainly be with him. I breakfasted at
+home therefore, but was punctual to the latter engagement. "I hope you
+have breakfasted?" cried the captain, rather fiercely, as I entered. I
+satisfied him on this point; and then, after a minute of demure
+reflection, he resumed, "You are lucky; for Marie boiled the cocoa, and,
+after throwing away the liquor, she buttered and peppered the shells,
+and served them for me to eat! I don't see how she made such a mistake,
+for I was very particular in my directions, and be d----d to her! I
+don't care so much about my own breakfast neither, for that can be had
+at the next _cafe_; but the poor creature has lost hers, which I told
+her to cook out of the rest of the cocoa." I had the curiosity to
+inquire how he had made out to tell Marie to do all this. "Why, I showed
+her the cocoa, to be sure, and then told her to _boily vous-meme_."
+There was no laughing at this, and so I went with the captain to a
+_cafe_; after which we proceeded in quest of the _gullyteen_, which he
+was particularly anxious to see.
+
+My rides often extend to the heights behind Malmaison and St. Cloud,
+where there is a fine country, and where some of the best views in the
+vicinity of Paris are to be obtained. As the court is at St. Cloud, I
+often meet different members of the royal family dashing to or from
+town, or perhaps passing from one of their abodes to another. The style
+is pretty uniform, for I do not remember to have ever met the king but
+once with less than eight horses. The exception was quite early one
+morning, when he was going into the country with very little _eclat_,
+accompanied by the Dauphine. Even on this occasion he was in a carriage
+and six, followed by another with four, and attended by a dozen mounted
+men. These royal progresses are truly magnificent; and they serve
+greatly to enliven the road, as we live so near the country palace. The
+king has been quite lately to a camp formed at St. Omer, and I happened
+to meet a portion of his equipages on their return. The carriages I saw
+were very neatly built post-chaises, well leathered, and contained what
+are here called the "officers of the mouth," alias "cooks and
+purveyors." They were all drawn by four horses. This was a great
+occasion--furniture being actually sent from the palace of Compiegne for
+the king's lodgings, and the court is said to have employed seventy
+different vehicles to transport it. I saw about a dozen.
+
+Returning the other night from a dinner-party, given on the banks of the
+Seine, a few miles above us, I saw flaring lights gleaming along the
+highway, which, at first, caused nearly as much conjecture as some of
+the adventures of Don Quixotte. My horse proving a little restive, I
+pulled up, placing the cabriolet on one side of the road, for the first
+impression was that the cattle employed at some funeral procession had
+taken flight and were running away. It proved to be the Dauphine dashing
+towards St. Cloud. This was the first time I had ever met any of the
+royal equipages at night, and the passage was much the most picturesque
+of any I had hitherto seen. Footmen, holding flaming flambeaux, rode in
+pairs in front, by the side of the carriage, and in its rear; the
+_piqueur_ scouring along the road in advance, like a rocket. By the way,
+a lady of the court told me lately that Louis XVIII. had lost some of
+his French by the emigration, for he did not know how to pronounce this
+word _piqueur_.
+
+On witnessing all this magnificence, the mind is carried back a few
+generations, in the inquiry after the progress of luxury, and the usages
+of our fathers. Coaches were first used in England in the reign of
+Elizabeth. It is clear enough, by the pictures in the Louvre, that in
+the time of Louis XIV. the royal carriages were huge, clumsy vehicles,
+with at least three seats. Mademoiselle de Montpensier, in her Memoirs,
+tells us how often she took her place at the window, in order to admire
+the graceful attitudes of M. de Lauzun, who rode near it. There is still
+in existence, in the Bibliotheque du Roi, a letter of Henry IV. to
+Sully, in which the king explains to the grand master the reason why he
+could not come to the arsenal that day; the excuse being that the queen
+_was using the carriage!_ To-day his descendant seldom moves at a pace
+slower than ten miles the hour, is drawn by eight horses, and is usually
+accompanied by one or more empty vehicles of equal magnificence to
+receive him, in the event of an accident.
+
+Notwithstanding all this regal splendour, the turn-outs of Paris, as a
+whole, are by no means remarkable. The genteelest and the fashionable
+carriage is the chariot. I like the proportions of the French carriages
+better than those of the English or our own, the first being too heavy,
+and the last too light. The French vehicles appear to me to be in this
+respect a happy medium. But the finish is by no means equal to that of
+the English carriages, nor at all better than that of ours. There are
+relatively a large proportion of shabby-genteel equipages at Paris. Even
+the vehicles that are seen standing in the court of the Tuileries on a
+reception day are not at all superior to the better sort of American
+carriages, though the liveries are much more showy.
+
+Few people here own the carriages and horses they use. Even the
+strangers, who are obliged to have travelling vehicles rarely use them
+in town, the road and the streets requiring very different sorts of
+equipages. There are certain job-dealers who furnish all that is
+required for a stipulated sum. You select the carriage and horses on
+trial and contract at so much a month, or at so much a year. The
+coachman usually comes with the equipage, as does the footman sometimes,
+though both are paid by the person taking the coach. They will wear your
+livery, if you choose, and you can have your arms put on the carriage if
+desirable. I pay five hundred francs a month for a carriage and horses,
+and forty francs for a coachman. I believe this is the usual price. I
+have a right to have a pair of horses always at my command, finding
+nothing but the stable, and even this would be unnecessary in Paris. If
+we go away from our own stable, I pay five francs a day extra. There is
+a very great convenience to strangers, in particular, in this system,
+for one can set up and lay down a carriage, without unnecessary trouble
+or expense, as it may be wanted. In everything of this nature, we have
+no town that has the least character, or the conveniences, of a capital.
+
+The French have little to boast of in the way of horseflesh. Most of the
+fine coach and cabriolet cattle of Paris come from Mecklenburgh, though
+some are imported from England. It is not common to meet with a very
+fine animal of the native breed. In America, land is so plenty and so
+cheap, that we keep a much larger proportion of brute force than is kept
+here. It is not uncommon with us to meet with those who live by day's
+work, using either oxen or horses. The consequence is that many beasts
+are raised with little care, and with scarcely any attention to the
+breeds. We find many good ones. In spite of bad grooming, little
+training, and hard work, I greatly question if even England possesses a
+larger proportion of good horses, comparing the population of the two
+countries, than America. Our animals are quicker footed, and at
+trotting, I suspect, we could beat the world; Christendom, certainly.
+The great avenue between the garden of the Tuileries and the Bois de
+Boulogne, with the _allees_ of the latter, are the places to meet the
+fast-goers of the French capital, and I am strongly of opinion that
+there is no such exhibition of speed, in either, as one meets on the
+Third Avenue of New York. As for the Avenue de Neuilly, our sulky riders
+would vanish like the wind from anything I have seen on it; although one
+meets there, occasionally, fine animals from all parts of Europe.
+
+The cattle of the _diligences_, of the post-houses, and even of the
+cavalry of France, are solid, hardy and good feeders, but they are
+almost entirely without speed or action. The two former are very much
+the same, and it is a hard matter to get more than eight miles out of
+them without breaking into a gallop, or more than ten, if put under the
+whip. Now, a short time previously to leaving home, I went eleven
+measured miles, in a public coach, in two minutes less than an hour, the
+whip untouched. I sat on the box, by the side of the driver, and know
+that this was done under a pull that actually disabled one of his arms,
+and that neither of the four animals broke its trot. It is not often our
+roads will admit of this, but, had we the roads of England, I make
+little doubt we should altogether outdo her in speed. As for the horses
+used here in the public conveyances, and for the post routes, they are
+commonly compact, clumsy beasts, with less force than their shape would
+give reason to suppose. Their manes are long and shaggy, the fetlocks
+are rarely trimmed, the shoes are seldom corked, and, when there is a
+little coquetry, the tail is braided. In this trim, with a coarse
+harness, that is hardly ever cleaned, traces of common rope, and half
+the time no blinkers or reins, away they scamper, with their heads in
+all directions, like the classical representation of a team in an
+ancient car, through thick and thin, working with all their might to do
+two posts within an hour, one being the legal measure. These animals
+appear to possess a strange _bonhomie_, being obedient, willing and
+tractable, although, in the way of harness and reins, they are pretty
+much their own masters.
+
+My excursions in the environs have made me acquainted with a great
+variety of modes of communication between the capital and its adjacent,
+villages. Although Paris is pared down so accurately, and is almost
+without suburbs, the population, within a circuit of ten miles in each
+direction, is almost equal to that of Paris itself. St. Denis has
+several thousands, St. Germain the same, and Versailles is still a town
+of considerable importance. All these places, with villages out of
+number, keep up daily intercourse with the city, and in addition to the
+hundreds of vegetable carts that constantly pass to and fro, there are
+many conveyances that are exclusively devoted to passengers. The
+cheapest and lowest is called a _coucou_ for no reason that I can see,
+unless it be that a man looks very like a fool to have a seat in one of
+them. They are large cabriolets, with two and even three seats. The
+wheels are enormous, and there is commonly a small horse harnessed by
+the side of a larger, in the hills, to drag perhaps eight or nine
+people. One is amazed to see the living carrion that is driven about a
+place like Paris, in these uncouth vehicles. The river is so exceedingly
+crooked, that it is little used by travellers above Rouen.
+
+The internal transportation of France, where the lines of the rivers are
+not followed, is carried on, almost exclusively, in enormous carts,
+drawn by six and even eight heavy horses, harnessed in a line. The
+burthen is often as large as a load of hay, not quite so high, perhaps,
+but generally longer, care being had to preserve the balance in such a
+manner as to leave no great weight on the shaft horse. These teams are
+managed with great dexterity, and I have often stopped and witnessed,
+with admiration, the entrance of one of them into a yard, as it passed
+from a crowded street probably not more than thirty feet wide. But the
+evolutions of the _diligence_, guided as it chiefly is by the whip, and
+moving on a trot, are really nice affairs. I came from La Grange, some
+time since, in one, and I thought that we should dash everything to
+pieces in the streets, and yet nothing was injured. At the close of the
+journey, our team of five horses, two on the pole and three on the lead,
+wheeled, without breaking its trot, into a street that was barely wide
+enough to receive the huge vehicle, and this too without human
+direction, the driver being much too drunk to be of any service. These
+_diligences_ are uncouth objects to the eye; but, for the inside
+passengers, they are much more comfortable, so far as my experience
+extends than either the American stage or the English coach.
+
+The necessity of passing the _barriere_ two or three times a day, has
+also made me acquainted with the great amount of drunkenness that
+prevails in Paris. Wine can be had outside of the walls, for about half
+the price which is paid for it within the town, as it escapes the
+_octroi_, or city duty. The people resort to these places for
+indulgence, and there is quite as much low blackguardism and guzzling
+here, as is to be met with in any sea-port I know.
+
+Provisions of all sorts, too, are cheaper without the gates, for the
+same reason; and the lower classes resort to them to celebrate their
+weddings, and on other eating and drinking occasions. "Ici on fait
+festins et noces,"[23] is a common sign, no barrier being without more or
+less of these houses. The _guinguettes_ are low gardens, answering to
+the English tea-gardens of the humblest class, with a difference in the
+drinkables and other fare. The base of Montmartre is crowded with them.
+
+[Footnote 23: Weddings and merry-makings are kept here.]
+
+One sometimes meets with an unpleasant adventure among these exhilarated
+gentry; for, though I think a low Frenchman is usually better natured
+when a little _grise_ than when perfectly sober, this is not always the
+case. Quite lately I had an affair that might have terminated seriously,
+but for our good luck. It is usual to have two sets of reins to the
+cabriolets, the horses being very spirited, and the danger from
+accidents in streets so narrow and crowded being great. I had dined in
+town, and was coming out about nine o'clock. The horse was walking up
+the ascent to the Barriere de Clichy, when I observed, by the shadow
+cast from a bright moon, that there was a man seated on the cabriolet,
+behind. Charles was driving, and I ordered him to tell the man to get
+off. Finding words of no effect, Charles gave him a slight tap with his
+whip. The fellow instantly sprang forward, seized the horse by the
+reins, and attempted to drag him to one side of the road. Failing in
+this, he fled up the street. Charles now called out that he had cut the
+reins. I seized the other pair and brought the horse up, and, as soon as
+he was under command, we pursued our assailant at a gallop. He was soon
+out of breath, and we captured him. As I felt very indignant at the
+supposed outrage, which might have cost, not us only, but others, their
+lives, I gave him in charge to two gendarmes at the gate, with my
+address, promising to call at the police office in the morning.
+
+Accordingly, next day I presented myself, and was surprised to find that
+the man had been liberated. I had discovered, in the interval, that the
+leather had broken, and had not been cut, which materially altered the
+_animus_ of the offence, and I had come with an intention to ask for the
+release of the culprit, believing it merely a sally of temper, which a
+night's imprisonment sufficiently punished; but the man being _charged_
+with cutting the rein, I thought the magistrate had greatly forgotten
+himself in discharging him before I appeared. Indeed I made no scruple
+in telling him so. We had some warm words, and parted. I make no doubt I
+was mistaken for an Englishman, and that the old national antipathy was
+at work against me.
+
+I was a good deal surprised at the termination of this, my first essay
+in French criminal justice. So many eulogiums have been passed on the
+police, that I was not prepared to find this indifference to an offence
+like that of wantonly cutting the reins of a spirited cabriolet horse,
+in the streets of Paris; for such was the charge on which the man stood
+committed. I mentioned the affair to a friend, and he said that the
+police was good only for political offences, and that the government
+rather leaned to the side of the rabble, in order to find support with
+them, in the event of any serious movement. This, you will remember, was
+the opinion of a Frenchman, and not mine; for I only relate the facts
+(one conjecture excepted), and to do justice to all parties, it is
+proper to add that my friend is warmly opposed to the present _regime_.
+
+I have uniformly found the gendarmes civil, and even obliging; and I
+have seen them show great forbearance on various occasions. As to the
+marvellous stories we have heard of the police of Paris, I suspect they
+have been gotten up for effect, such things being constantly practised
+here. One needs be behind the curtain, in a great many things, to get a
+just idea of the true state of the world. A laughable instance has just
+occurred, within my knowledge, of a story that has been got up for
+effect. The town was quite horrified lately, with an account, in the
+journals, of a careless nurse permitting a child to fall into the
+_fosse_ of the great bears, in the Jardin des Plantes, and of the bears
+eating up the dear little thing, to the smallest fragment, before
+succour could be obtained. Happening to be at the garden soon after, in
+the company of one connected with the establishment, I inquired into the
+circumstances, and was told that the nurses were very careless with the
+children, and that the story was published in order that the bears
+should not eat up any child hereafter, rather than because they had
+eaten up a child heretofore!
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XVIII.
+
+Personal Intercourse.--Parisian Society and Hospitality.--Influence of
+Money.--Fiacres.--M. de Lameth.--Strife of Courtesy.--Standard of
+Delicacy.--French Dinners.--Mode of Visiting.--The Chancellor of
+France.--The Marquis de Marbois.--Political Coteries.--Paris Lodgings.
+--A French Party.--An English Party.--A splendid Ball.--Effects of good
+Breeding.--Characteristic Traits.--Influence of a Court.
+
+
+To MRS. POMEROY, COOPERSTOWN.
+
+I have said very little, in my previous letters, on the subject of our
+personal intercourse with the society of Paris. It is not always easy
+for one to be particular in these matters, and maintain the reserve that
+is due to others. Violating the confidence he may have received through
+his hospitality, is but an indifferent return from the guest to the
+host. Still there are men, if I may so express it, so public in their
+very essence, certainly in their lives, that propriety is less concerned
+with a repetition of their sentiments, and with delineations of their
+characters, than in ordinary cases; for the practice of the world has
+put them so much on their guard against the representations of
+travellers, that there is more danger of rendering a false account, by
+becoming their dupes, than of betraying them in their unguarded moments.
+I have scarcely ever been admitted to the presence of a real notoriety,
+that I did not find the man, or woman--sex making little difference--an
+actor; and this, too, much beyond the everyday and perhaps justifiable
+little practices of conventional life. Inherent simplicity of character
+is one of the rarest, as, tempered by the tone imparted by refinement,
+it is the loveliest of all our traits, though it is quite common to meet
+with those who affect it, with an address that is very apt to deceive
+the ordinary, and most especially the flattered, observer.
+
+Opportunity, rather than talents, is the great requisite for circulating
+gossip; a very moderate degree of ability sufficing for the observation
+which shall render private anecdotes, more especially when they relate
+to persons of celebrity, of interest to the general reader. But there is
+another objection to being merely the medium of information of this low
+quality, that I should think would have great influence with every one
+who has the common self-respect of a gentleman. _There is a tacit
+admission of inferiority_ in the occupation, that ought to prove too
+humiliating to a man accustomed to those associations, which imply
+equality. It is permitted to touch upon the habits and appearance of a
+truly great man; but to dwell upon the peculiarities of a duke, merely
+because he is a duke, is as much as to say he is your superior; a
+concession, I do not feel disposed to make in favour of any _mere duke_
+in Christendom.
+
+I shall not, however, be wholly silent on the general impressions left
+by the little I have seen of the society of Paris; and, occasionally,
+when it is characteristic, an anecdote may be introduced, for such
+things sometimes give distinctness, as well as piquancy, to a
+description.
+
+During our first winter in Paris, our circle, never very large, was
+principally confined to foreign families intermingled with a few French;
+but since our return to town, from St. Ouen, we have seen more of the
+people of the country. I should greatly mislead you, however, were I to
+leave the impression that our currency in the French capital has been at
+all general, for it certainly has not. Neither my health, leisure,
+fortune, nor opportunities, have permitted this. I believe few, perhaps
+no Americans, have very general access to the best society of any large
+European town; at all events, I have met with no one who I have had any
+reason to think was much better off than myself in this respect; and, I
+repeat, my own familiarity with the circles of the capital is nothing to
+boast of. It is in Paris, as it is everywhere else, as respects those
+who are easy of access. In all large towns there is to be found a
+troublesome and pushing set, who, requiring notoriety, obtrude
+themselves on strangers, sometimes with sounding names, and always with
+offensive pretensions of some sort or other; but the truly respectable
+and estimable class, in every country, except in cases that cannot
+properly be included in the rule, are to be sought. Now, one must feel
+that he has peculiar claims, or be better furnished with letters than
+happened to be my case, to get a ready admission into this set, or,
+having obtained it, to feel that his position enabled him to maintain
+the intercourse, with the ease and freedom that could alone render it
+agreeable. To be shown about as a lion, when circumstances offer the
+means; to be stuck up at a dinner-table, as a piece of luxury, like
+strawberries in February, or peaches in April,--can hardly be called
+association: the terms being much on a par with that which forms the
+_liaisons_, between him who gives the entertainment, and the hired plate
+with which his table is garnished. With this explanation, then, you are
+welcome to an outline of the little I know on the subject.
+
+One of the errors respecting the French, which has been imported into
+America, through England, is the impression that they are not
+hospitable. Since my residence here, I have often been at a loss to
+imagine how such a notion could have arisen, for I am acquainted with no
+town, in which it has struck me there is more true hospitality than in
+Paris. Not only are dinners, balls, and all the minor entertainments
+frequent, but there is scarcely a man, or a woman, of any note in
+society, who does not cause his or her doors to be opened, once a
+fortnight at least, and, in half the cases, once a week. At these
+_soirees_ invitations are sometimes given, it is true, but then they are
+general, and for the whole season; and it is not unusual, even, to
+consider them free to all who are on visiting terms with the family. The
+utmost simplicity and good taste prevail at these places, the
+refreshments being light and appropriate, and the forms exacting no more
+than what belongs to good breeding. You will, at once, conceive the
+great advantages that a stranger possesses in having access to such
+social resources. One, with a tolerable visiting list, may choose his
+circle for any particular evening, and if, by chance, the company should
+not happen to be to his mind, he has still before him the alternative of
+several other houses, which are certain to be open. It is not easy to
+say what can be more truly hospitable than this.
+
+The _petits soupers_, once so celebrated, are entirely superseded by the
+new distribution of time, which is probably the most rational that can
+be devised for a town life. The dinner is at six, an hour that is too
+early to interfere with the engagements of the evening, it being usually
+over at eight, and too late to render food again necessary that night;
+an arrangement that greatly facilitates the evening intercourse,
+releasing it at once from all trouble and parade.
+
+It has often been said in favour of French society, that once within the
+doors of a _salon_, all are equal. This is not literally so, it being
+impossible that such a state of things can exist; nor is it desirable
+that it should, since it is confounding all sentiment and feeling,
+overlooking the claims of age, services, merit of every sort, and
+setting at nought the whole construction of society. It is not
+absolutely true that even rank is entirely forgotten in French society,
+though I think it sufficiently so to prevent any deference to it from
+being offensive. The social pretensions of a French peer are exceedingly
+well regulated, nor do I remember to have seen an instance in which a
+very young man has been particularly noticed on account of his having
+claims of this sort. Distinguished men are so very numerous in Paris,
+that they excite no great feeling, and the even course of society is
+little disturbed on their account.
+
+Although all within the doors of a French _salon_ are not perfectly
+equal, none are made unpleasantly to feel the indifference. I dare say
+there are circles in Paris, in which the mere possession of money may be
+a source of evident distinction, but it must be in a very inferior set.
+The French, while they are singularly alive to the advantages of money,
+and extremely liable to yield to its influence in all important matters,
+rarely permit any manifestations of its power to escape them in their
+ordinary intercourse. As a people, they appear to me to be ready to
+yield everything to money but its external homage. On these points they
+are the very converse of the Americans, who are hard to be bought, while
+they consider money the very base of all distinction. The origin of
+these peculiarities may be found in the respective conditions of the two
+countries.
+
+In America, fortunes are easily and rapidly acquired; pressure reduces
+few to want; he who serves is, if anything, more in demand than he who
+is to be served; and the want of temptation produces exemption from the
+liability to corruption. Men will, and do, daily _corrupt themselves_ in
+the rapacious pursuit of gain, but comparatively few are in the market
+to be bought and sold by others. Notwithstanding this, money being every
+man's goal, there is a secret, profound, and general deference for it,
+while money will do less than in almost any other country in
+Christendom. Here, few young men look forward to gaining distinction by
+making money; they search for it as a means, whereas with us it is the
+end. We have little need of arms in America, and the profession is in
+less request than that of law or merchandize. Of the arts and letters
+the country possesses none, or next to none; and there is no true
+sympathy with either. The only career that is felt as likely to lead,
+and which can lead, to distinction independently of money, is that of
+politics, and, as a whole, this is so much occupied by sheer
+adventurers, with little or no pretentions to the name of statesmen,
+that it is scarcely reputable to belong to it. Although money has no
+influence in politics, or as little as well may be, even the successful
+politician is but a secondary man in ordinary society in comparison with
+the _millionnaire_. Now all this is very much reversed in Paris: money
+does much, while it seems to do but little. The writer of a successful
+comedy would be a much more important personage in the _coteries_ of
+Paris than M. Rothschild; and the inventor of a new bonnet would enjoy
+much more _eclat_ than the inventor of a clever speculation. I question
+if there be a community on earth in which gambling risks in the funds,
+for instance, are more general than in this, and yet the subject appears
+to be entirely lost sight of out of the Bourse.
+
+The little social notoriety that is attached to military distinction
+here has greatly surprised me. It really seems as if France has had so
+much military renown as to be satiated with it. One is elbowed
+constantly by generals, who have gained this or that victory, and yet no
+one seems to care anything about them. I do not mean that the nation is
+indifferent to military glory, but society appears to care little or
+nothing about it. I have seen a good deal of fuss made with the writer
+of a few clever verses, but I have never seen any made with a hero.
+Perhaps it was because the verses were new, and the victories old.
+
+The perfect good taste and indifference which the French manifest
+concerning the private affairs, and concerning the mode of living, of
+one who is admitted to the _salons_, has justly extorted admiration,
+even from the English, the people of all others who most submit to a
+contrary feeling. A hackney-coach is not always admitted into a
+court-yard, but both men and women make their visits in them, without
+any apparent hesitation. No one seems ashamed of confessing poverty. I
+do not say that women of quality often use _fiacres_ to make their
+visits, but men do, and I have seen women in them openly whom I have met
+in some of the best houses in Paris. It is better to go in a private
+carriage, or in a _remise_, if one can, but few hesitate, when their
+means are limited, about using the former. In order to appreciate this
+self-denial, or simplicity, or good sense, it is necessary to remember
+that a Paris _fiacre_ is not to be confounded with any other vehicle on
+earth. I witnessed, a short time since, a ludicrous instance of the
+different degrees of feeling that exist on this point among different
+people. A---- and myself went to the house of an English woman our
+acquaintance who is not very choice in her French. A Mrs. ----, the wife
+of a colonel in the English army, sat next A----, as a French lady
+begged that her carriage might be ordered. Our hostess told her servant
+to order the _fiacre_ of Madame ----. Now Madame ---- kept her chariot,
+to my certain knowledge, but she disregarded the mistake. A---- soon
+after desired that our carriage might come next. The good woman of the
+house, who loved to be busy, again called for the _fiacre_ of Madame
+----. I saw the foot of A---- in motion, but catching my eye, she
+smiled, and the thing passed off. The "voiture de Madame ----," or our
+own carriage, was announced just as Mrs. ---- was trying to make a
+servant understand she wished for hers. "Le fiacre de Madame ----,"
+again put in the bustling hostess. This was too much for a colonel's
+lady, and, with a very pretty air of distress, she took care to explain,
+in a way that all might hear her, that it was a _remise_.
+
+I dare say, vulgar prejudices influence vulgar minds, here, as
+elsewhere, and yet I must say, that I never knew any one hesitate about
+giving an address on account of the humility of the lodgings. It is to
+be presumed that the manner in which families that are historical, and
+of long-established rank, were broken down by the revolution, has had an
+influence in effecting this healthful state of feeling.
+
+The great tact and careful training of the women, serve to add very much
+to the grace of French society. They effectually prevent all
+embarrassments from the question of precedency, by their own decisions.
+Indeed, it appears to be admitted, that when there is any doubt on these
+points, the mistress of the house shall settle it in her own way. I
+found myself lately, at a small dinner, the only stranger, and the
+especially invited guest, standing near Madame la Marquise at the moment
+the service was announced. A bishop made one of the trio. I could not
+precede a man of his years and profession, and he was too polite to
+precede a stranger. It was a nice point. Had it been a question between
+a duke and myself, as a stranger, and under the circumstances of the
+invitation, I should have had the _pas_, but even the lady hesitated
+about discrediting a father of the church. She delayed but an instant,
+and, smiling, she begged us to follow her to the table, avoiding the
+decision altogether. In America such a thing could not have happened,
+for no woman, by a fiction of society, is supposed to know how to walk
+in company without support; but, here, a woman will not spoil her
+curtsey, on entering a room, by leaning on an arm, if she can well help
+it. The practice of tucking up a brace of females (liver and gizzard, as
+the English coarsely, but not inaptly, term it), under one's arms, in
+order to enter a small room that is crowded in a way to render the
+movements of even one person difficult, does not prevail here, it being
+rightly judged that a proper _tenue_, a good walk, and a graceful
+movement, are all impaired by it. This habit also singularly contributes
+to the comfort of your sex, by rendering them more independent of ours.
+No one thinks, except in very particular cases, of going to the door to
+see a lady into her carriage, a custom too provincial to prevail in a
+capital, anywhere. Still, there is an amusing assiduity among the men,
+on certain points of etiquette, that has sometimes made me laugh;
+though, in truth, every concession to politeness being a tribute to
+benevolence, is respectable, unless spoiled in the manner. As we are
+gossiping about trifles, I will mention a usage or two, that to you will
+at least be novel.
+
+I was honoured with a letter from le Chevalier Alexandre de Lameth,[24]
+accompanied by an offering of a book, and I took an early opportunity to
+pay my respects to him. I found this gentleman, who once played so
+conspicuous a part in the politics of France, and who is now a liberal
+deputy, at breakfast, in a small cabinet, at the end of a suite of four
+rooms. He received me politely, conversed a good deal of America, in
+which country he had served as a colonel, under Rochambeau, and I took
+my leave. That M. de Lameth should rise, and even see me into the next
+room, was what every one would expect, and there I again took my leave
+of him. But he followed me to each door, in succession, and when, with a
+little gentle violence, I succeeded in shutting him in the ante-chamber,
+he seemed to yield to my entreaties not to give himself any further
+trouble. I was on the landing, on my way down, when, hearing the door of
+M. de Lameth's apartment open, I turned and saw its master standing
+before it, to give and receive the last bow. Although this extreme
+attention to the feelings of others, and delicacy of demeanour, rather
+marks the Frenchman of the old school, perhaps, it is by no means
+uncommon here. General Lafayette, while he permits me to see him with
+very little ceremony, scarcely ever suffers me to leave him without
+going with me as far as two or three doors. This, in my case, he does
+more from habit than anything else, for he frequently does not even rise
+when I enter; and, sometimes, when I laughingly venture to say so much
+ceremony is scarcely necessary between us, he will take me at my word,
+and go back to his writing, with perfect simplicity.
+
+[Footnote 24: Since dead.]
+
+The reception between the women, I see plainly, is graduated with an
+unpretending but nice regard to their respective claims. They rise, even
+to men, a much more becoming and graceful habit than that of America,
+except in evening circles, or in receiving intimates. I never saw a
+French woman offer her hand to a male visitor, unless a relative, though
+it is quite common for females to kiss each other, when the _reunion_ is
+not an affair of ceremony. The practice of kissing among men still
+exists, though it is not very common at Paris. It appears, to be
+gradually going out with the earrings. I have never had an offer from a
+Frenchman, of my own age, to kiss me, but it has frequently occurred
+with my seniors. General Lafayette practises it still, with all his
+intimates.
+
+I was seated, the other evening, in quiet conversation, with Madame la
+Princesse de ----. Several people had come and gone in the course of an
+hour, and all had been received in the usual manner. At length the
+_huissier_, walking fast through the ante-chamber, announced the wife of
+an ambassador. The Princesse, at the moment, was seated on a divan, with
+her feet raised so as not to touch the floor. I was startled with the
+suddenness and vehemence of her movements. She sprang to her feet, and
+rather ran than walked across the vast _salon_ to the door, where she
+was met by her visitor, who, observing the _empressement_ of her
+hostess, through the vista of rooms, had rushed forward as fast as
+decorum would at all allow, in order to anticipate her at the door. It
+was my impression, at first, that they were bosom friends, about to be
+restored to each other, after a long absence, and that the impetuosity
+of their feelings had gotten the better of their ordinary self-command.
+No such thing; it was merely a strife of courtesy, for the meeting was
+followed by an extreme attention to all the forms of society, profound
+curtsies, and the elaborated demeanour which marks ceremony rather than
+friendship.
+
+Much has been said about the latitude of speech among the women of
+France, and comparisons have been made between them and our own females,
+to the disadvantage of the former. If the American usages are to be
+taken as the standard of delicacy in such matters, I know of no other
+people who come up to it. As to our mere feelings, habit can render
+anything proper, or anything improper, and it is not an easy matter to
+say where the line, in conformity with good sense and good taste, should
+be actually drawn. I confess a leaning to the American school, but how
+far I am influenced by education it would not be easy for me to say
+myself. Foreigners affirm that we are squeamish, and that we wound
+delicacy oftener by the awkward attempts to protect it, than if we had
+more simplicity. There may be some truth in this, for though cherishing
+the notions of my youth, I never belonged to the ultra school at home,
+which, I believe you will agree with me, rather proves low breeding than
+good breeding. One sees instances of this truth, not only every day, but
+every hour of the day. Yesterday, in crossing the Tuileries, I was
+witness of a ludicrous scene that sufficiently illustrates what I mean.
+The statues of the garden have little or no drapery. A countryman, and
+two women of the same class, in passing one, were struck with this
+circumstance, and their bursts of laughter, running and hiding their
+faces, and loud giggling, left no one in ignorance of the cause of their
+extreme bashfulness. Thousands of both sexes pass daily beneath the same
+statue, without a thought of its nudity, and it is looked upon as a
+noble piece of sculpture.
+
+In dismissing this subject, which is every way delicate, I shall merely
+say that usage tolerates a license of speech, of which you probably have
+no idea, but that I think one hears very rarely from a French woman of
+condition little that would not be uttered by an American female under
+similar circumstances. So far as my experience goes, there is a marked
+difference in this particular between the women of a middle station and
+those of a higher rank; by rank, however, I mean hereditary rank, for
+The revolution has made a _pele mele_ in the _salons_ of Paris.
+
+Although the _petits soupers_ have disappeared, the dinners are very
+sufficient substitutes: they are given at a better hour; and the service
+of a French entertainment, so quiet, so entirely free from effort, or
+chatter about food, is admirably adapted to rendering them agreeable. I
+am clearly of opinion that no one ought to give any entertainment that
+has not the means of making it pass off as a matter-of-course thing, and
+without effort. I have certainly seen a few fussy dinners here, but they
+are surprisingly rare. At home, we have plenty of people who know that a
+party that has a laboured air is inherently vulgar, but how few are
+there that know how to treat a brilliant entertainment as a mere matter
+of course! Paris is full of those desirable houses in which the thing is
+understood.
+
+The forms of the table vary a little, according to the set one is in. In
+truly French houses, until quite lately, I believe, it was not the
+custom to change the knife,--the duty of which, by the way, is not
+great, the cookery requiring little more than the fork. In families that
+mingle more with strangers, both are changed, as with us. A great dinner
+is served very much as at home, so far as the mere courses are
+concerned, though I have seen the melons follow the soup. This I believe
+to be in good taste, though it is not common; and it struck me at first
+as being as much out of season as the old New England custom of eating
+the pudding before the meat. But the French give small dinners (small in
+name, though certainly very great in execution), in which the dishes are
+served singly or nearly so, the entertainment resembling those given by
+the Turks, and being liable to the same objection; for when there is but
+a single dish before one, and it is not known whether there is to be any
+more, it is an awkward thing to decline eating. Such dinners are
+generally of the best quality, but I think they should never be given,
+except where there is sufficient intimacy to embolden the guest to say
+_jam satis_.
+
+The old devotion to the sex is not so exclusively the occupation of a
+French _salon_ as it was probably half a century since. I have been in
+several, where the men were grouped in a corner talking politics, while
+the women amused each other as best they could, in cold, formal lines,
+looking like so many figures placed there to show off the latest modes
+of the toilette. I do not say this is absolutely common, but it is less
+rare than you might be apt to suppose.
+
+I can tell you little of the habit of reading manuscripts in society.
+Such things are certainly done, for I have been invited to be present on
+one or two occasions; but having a horror of such exhibitions, I make it
+a point to be indisposed, the choice lying between the megrims before or
+after them. Once, and once only, I have heard a poet recite his verses
+in a well-filled drawing-room; and though I have every reason to think
+him clever, my ear was so little accustomed to the language, that, in
+the mouthing of French recitation, I lost nearly all of it.
+
+I have had an odd pleasure in driving from one house to another, on
+particular evenings, in order to produce as strong contrasts as my
+limited visiting-list will procure. Having a fair opportunity a few
+nights since, in consequence of two or three invitations coming in for
+the evening on which several houses where I occasionally called were
+opened, I determined to make a night of it, in order to note the effect.
+As A---- did not know several of the people, I went alone, and you may
+possibly be amused with an account of my adventures: they shall be told.
+
+In the first place, I had to dress, in order to go to dinner at a house
+that I had never entered, and with a family of which I had never seen a
+soul. These are incidents which frequently come over a stranger, and at
+first were not a little awkward; but use hardens us to much greater
+misfortunes. At six, then, I stepped punctually into my _coupe_, and
+gave Charles the necessary number and street. I ought to tell you that
+the invitation had come a few days before, and in a fit of curiosity I
+had accepted it, and sent a card, without having the least idea who my
+host and hostess were, beyond their names. There was something _piquant_
+in this ignorance, and I had almost made up my mind to go in the same
+mysterious manner, leaving all to events, when happening, in an idle
+moment, to ask a lady of my acquaintance, and for whom I have a great
+respect, if she knew a Madame de ----, to my surprise, her answer was,
+"Most certainly; she is my cousin, and you are to dine there to-morrow."
+I said no more, though this satisfied me that my hosts were people of
+some standing. While driving to their hotel, it struck me, under all the
+circumstances, it might be well to know more of them, and I stopped at
+the gate of a female friend, who knows everybody, and who, I was
+certain, would receive me even at that unseasonable hour. I was
+admitted, explained my errand, and inquired if she knew a M. de ----.
+"Quelle question!" she exclaimed--"M. de ---- est Chancelier de France!"
+Absurd and even awkward as it might have proved, but for this lucky
+thought, I should have dined with the French Lord High Chancellor,
+without having the smallest suspicion of who he was!
+
+The hotel was a fine one, though the apartment was merely good, and the
+reception, service, and general style of the house were so simple that
+neither would have awakened the least suspicion of the importance of my
+hosts. The party was small and the dinner modest. I found the
+_chancelier_ a grave dignified man, a little curious on the subject of
+America, and his wife apparently a woman of great good sense, and I
+should think, of a good deal of attainment. Everything went off in the
+quietest manner possible, and I was sorry when it was time to go.
+
+From this dinner, I drove to the hotel of the Marquis de Marbois, to pay
+a visit of digestion. M. de Marbois retires so early, on account of his
+great age, that one is obliged to be punctual, or he will find the gate
+locked at nine. The company had got back into the drawing-room, and as
+the last week's guests were mostly there, as well as those who had just
+left the table, there might have been thirty people present, all of whom
+were men but two. One of the ladies was Madame de Souza, known in French
+literature as the writer of several clever novels of society. In the
+drawing-room were grouped, in clusters, the Grand Referendary, M.
+Cuvier, M. Daru, M. Villemain, M. de Plaisance, Mr. Brown, and many
+others of note. There seemed to be something in the wind, as the
+conversation was in low confidential whispers, attended by divers
+ominous shrugs. This could only be politics, and watching an
+opportunity, I questioned an acquaintance. The fact was really so. The
+appointed hour had come and the ministry of M. de Villele was in the
+agony. The elections had not been favourable, and it was expedient to
+make an attempt to reach the old end, by what is called a new
+combination. It is necessary to understand the general influence of
+political intrigues on certain _coteries_ of Paris, to appreciate the
+effect of this intelligence, on a drawing-room filled, like this, with
+men who had been actors in the principal events of France for forty
+years. The name of M. Cuvier was even mentioned as one of the new
+ministers. Comte Roy was also named as likely to be the new premier. I
+was told that this gentleman was one of the greatest landed proprietors
+of France, his estates being valued at four millions of dollars. The
+fact is curious, as showing, not on vulgar rumour, but from a
+respectable source, what is deemed a first-rate landed property in this
+country. It is certainly no merit, nor do I believe it is any very great
+advantage; but I think we might materially beat this, even in America.
+The company soon separated, and I retired.
+
+From the Place de la Madeleine, I drove to a house near the Carrousel,
+where I had been invited to step in, in the course of the evening. All
+the buildings that remain within the intended parallelogram, which will
+some day make this spot one of the finest squares in the world, have
+been bought by the government, or nearly so, with the intent to have
+them pulled down, at a proper time; and the court bestows lodgings, _ad
+interim_, among them, on its favourites. Madame de ---- was one of these
+favoured persons, and she occupies a small apartment in the third story
+of one of these houses. The rooms were neat and well-arranged, but
+small. Probably the largest does not exceed fifteen feet square. The
+approach to a Paris lodging is usually either very good, or very bad. In
+the new buildings may be found some of the mediocrity of the new order
+of things; but in all those which were erected previously to the
+revolution, there is nothing but extremes in this, as in most other
+things: great luxury and elegance, or great meanness and discomfort. The
+house of Madame de ---- happens to be of the latter class, and although
+all the disagreeables have disappeared from her own rooms, one is
+compelled to climb up to them, through a dark well of a staircase, by
+flights of steps not much better than those we use in our stables. You
+have no notion of such staircases as those I had just descended in the
+hotels of the _chancelier_ and the _president premier_;[25] nor have we
+any just idea, as connected with respectable dwellings, of these I had
+now to clamber up. M. de ---- is a man of talents and great
+respectability, and his wife is exceedingly clever, but they are not
+rich. He is a professor, and she is an artist. After having passed so
+much of my youth on top-gallant yards, and in becketting royals, you are
+not to suppose, however, I had any great difficulty in getting up these
+stairs, narrow, steep, and winding as they were.
+
+[Footnote 25: M. de Marbois was the first president of the Court of
+Accounts.]
+
+We are now at the door, and I have rung. On whom do you imagine the
+curtain will rise? On a _reunion_ of philosophers come to discuss
+questions in botany, with M. de ----, or on artists, assembled to talk
+over the troubles of their profession, with his wife? The door opens,
+and I enter.
+
+The little drawing-room is crowded; chiefly with men. Two card-tables
+are set, and at one I recognize a party, in which are three dukes of the
+_vieille cour_, with M. de Duras at their head! The rest of the company
+was a little more mixed, but, on the whole, it savoured strongly of
+Coblentz and the _emigration_. This was more truly French than anything
+I had yet stumbled on. One or two of the grandees looked at me as if,
+better informed than Scott, they knew that General Lafayette had not
+gone to America to live. Some of these gentlemen certainly do not love
+us; but I had cut out too much work for the night to stay and return the
+big looks of even dukes, and, watching an opportunity, when the eyes of
+Madame de ---- were another way, I stole out of the room.
+
+Charles now took his orders, and we drove down into the heart of the
+town somewhere near the general post-office, or into those mazes of
+streets that near two years of practice have not yet taught me to
+thread. We entered the court of a large hotel, that was brilliantly
+lighted, and I ascended, by a noble flight of steps, to the first floor.
+Ante-chambers communicated with a magnificent saloon, which appeared to
+be near forty feet square. The ceilings were lofty, and the walls were
+ornamented with military trophies, beautifully designed, and which had
+the air of being embossed and gilded. I had got into the hotel of one of
+Napoleon's marshals, you will say, or at least into one of a marshal of
+the old _regime_. The latter conjecture may be true, but the house is
+now inhabited by a great woollen manufacturer, whom the events of the
+day has thrown into the presence of all these military emblems. I found
+the worthy _industriel_ surrounded by a group, composed of men of his
+own stamp, eagerly discussing the recent changes in the government. The
+women, of whom there might have been a dozen, were ranged, like a
+neglected parterre, along the opposite side of the room. I paid my
+compliments, staid a few minutes, and stole away to the next engagement.
+
+We had now to go to a little retired house on the Champs Elysees. There
+were only three or four carriages before the door, and on ascending to a
+small but very near apartment, I found some twenty people collected. The
+mistress of the house was an English lady, single, of a certain age, and
+a daughter of the Earl of ----, who was once governor of New York. Here
+was a very different set. One or two ladies of the old court, women of
+elegant manners, and seemingly of good information,--several English
+women, pretty, quiet, and clever, besides a dozen men of different
+nations. This was one of those little _reunions_ that are so common in
+Paris, among the foreigners, in which a small infusion of French serves
+to leaven a considerable batch of human beings from other parts of the
+world. As it is always a relief to me to speak my own language, after
+being a good while among foreigners, I staid an hour at this house. In
+the course of the evening an Irishman of great wit and of exquisite
+humour, one of the paragons of the age in his way, came in. In the
+course of conversation, this gentleman, who is the proprietor of an
+Irish estate, and a Catholic, told me of an atrocity in the laws of his
+country, of which until then I was ignorant. It seems that any younger
+brother, next heir, might claim the estate by turning Protestant, or
+drive the incumbent to the same act. I was rejoiced to hear that there
+was hardly an instance of such profligacy known.[26] To what baseness
+will not the struggle for political ascendency urge us!
+
+[Footnote 26: I believe this infamous law, however, has been repealed.]
+
+In the course of the evening, Mr. ----, the Irish gentleman, gravely
+introduced me to a Sir James ----, adding, with perfect gravity, "a
+gentleman whose father humbugged the Pope--humbugged infallibility." One
+could not but be amused with such an introduction, urged in a way so
+infinitely droll, and I ventured, at a proper moment, to ask an
+explanation, which, unless I was also humbugged, was as follows:--
+
+Among the _detenus_ in 1804, was Sir William ----, the father of Sir
+James ----, the person in question. Taking advantage of the presence of
+the Pope at Paris, he is said to have called on the good-hearted Pius,
+with great concern of manner, to state his case. He had left his sons in
+England, and through his absence they had fallen under the care of two
+Presbyterian aunts; as a father he was naturally anxious to rescue them
+from this perilous situation. "Now Pius," continued my merry informant,
+"quite naturally supposed that all this solicitude was in behalf of two
+orthodox Catholic souls, and he got permission from Napoleon for the
+return of so good a father to his own country, never dreaming that the
+conversion of the boys, if it ever took place, would only be from the
+Protestant Episcopal Church of England, to that of Calvin; or a rescue
+from one of the devil's furnaces, to pop them into another." I laughed
+at this story, I suppose with a little incredulity, but my Irish friend
+insisted on its truth, ending the conversation with a significant nod,
+Catholic as he was, and saying--"humbugged infallibility!"
+
+By this time it was eleven o'clock, and as I am obliged to keep
+reasonable hours, it was time to go to _the_ party of the evening. Count
+----, of the ---- Legation, gave a great ball. My carriage entered the
+line at the distance of near a quarter of a mile from the hotel;
+gendarmes being actively employed in keeping us all in our places. It
+was half an hour before I was set down, and the quadrilles were in full
+motion when I entered. It was a brilliant affair, much the most so I
+have ever yet witnessed in a private house. Some said there were fifteen
+hundred people present. The number seems incredible, and yet, when one
+comes to calculate, it may be so. As I got into my carriage to go away,
+Charles informed me that the people at the gates affirmed that more than
+six hundred carriages had entered the court that evening. By allowing an
+average of little more than two to each vehicle, we get the number
+mentioned.
+
+I do not know exactly how many rooms were opened on this occasion, but I
+should think there were fully a dozen. Two or three were very large
+salons, and the one in the centre, which was almost at fever-heat, had
+crimson hangings, by way of cooling one. I have never witnessed dancing
+at all comparable to that of the quadrilles of this evening. Usually
+there is either too much or too little of the dancing-master, but on
+this occasion every one seemed inspired with a love of the art. It was a
+beautiful sight to see a hundred charming young women, of the first
+families of Europe, for they were there of all nations, dressed with the
+simple elegance that is so becoming to the young of the sex, and which
+is never departed from here until after marriage, moving in perfect time
+to delightful music, as if animated by a common soul. The men, too, did
+better than usual, being less lugubrious and mournful than our sex is
+apt to be in dancing. I do not know how it is in private, but in the
+world, at Paris, every young woman seems to have a good mother; or, at
+least, one capable of giving her both a good tone and good taste.
+
+At this party I met the ----, an intimate friend of the ambassador, and
+one who also honours me with a portion of her friendship. In talking
+over the appearance of things, she told me that some hundreds of
+_applications for invitations_ to this ball had been made.
+"Applications! I cannot conceive of such meanness. In what manner?"
+"Directly; by note, by personal intercession--almost by tears. Be
+certain of it, many hundreds have been refused." In America we hear of
+refusals to go to balls, but we have not yet reached the pass of sending
+refusals to invite! "Do you see Mademoiselle ----, dancing in the set
+before you?" She pointed to a beautiful French girl, whom I had often
+seen at her house, but whose family was in a much lower station in
+society than herself, "Certainly--pray how came she here?" "I brought
+her. Her mother was dying to come, too, and she begged me to get an
+invitation for her and her daughter; but it would not do to bring the
+mother to such a place, and I was obliged to say no more tickets could
+be issued. I wished, however, to bring the daughter, she is so
+pretty, and we compromised the affair in that way." "And to this the
+mother assented!" "Assented! How can you doubt it--what funny American
+notions you have brought with you to France!"
+
+I got some droll anecdotes from my companion, concerning the ingredients
+of the company on this occasion, for she could be as sarcastic as she
+was elegant. A young woman near us attracted attention by a loud and
+vulgar manner of laughing. "Do you know that lady?" demanded my
+neighbour. "I have seen her before, but scarcely know her name." "She is
+the daughter of your acquaintance, the Marquise de ----." "Then she is,
+or was, a Mademoiselle de ----." "She is not, nor properly ever was, a
+Mademoiselle de ----. In the revolution the Marquis was imprisoned by
+you wicked republicans, and the Marquise fled to England, whence she
+returned, after an absence of three years, bringing with her this young
+lady, then an infant a few months old." "And Monsieur le Marquis?" "He
+never saw his daughter, having been beheaded in Paris, about a year
+before her birth." "_Quelle contretems_!" "_N'est-ce pas_?"
+
+It is a melancholy admission, but it is no less true, that good breeding
+is sometimes quite as active a virtue as good principles. How many more
+of the company present were born about a year after their fathers were
+beheaded, I have no means of knowing; but had it been the case with all
+of them, the company would have been of as elegant demeanour, and of
+much more _retenue_ of deportment, than we are accustomed to see, I will
+not say in _good_, but certainly in _general_ society at home. One of
+the consequences of good breeding is also a disinclination, positively a
+distaste, to pry into the private affairs of others. The little specimen
+to the contrary just named was rather an exception, owing to the
+character of the individual, and to the indiscretion of the young lady
+in laughing too loud, and then the affair of a birth so _very_
+posthumous was rather too _patent_ to escape all criticism.
+
+My friend was in a gossiping mood this evening, and as she was well
+turned of fifty, I ventured to continue the conversation. As some of the
+_liaisons_ which exist here must be novel to you, I shall mention one or
+two more.
+
+A Madame de J---- passed us, leaning on the arm of M. de C----. I knew
+the former, who was a widow; had frequently visited her, and had been
+surprised at the intimacy which existed between her and M. de C----, who
+always appeared quite at home in her house. I ventured to ask my
+neighbour if the gentleman were the brother of the lady. "Her brother!
+It is to be hoped not, as he is her husband." "Why does she not bear his
+name, if that be the case?" "Because her first husband is of a more
+illustrious family than her second; and then there are some difficulties
+on the score of fortune. No, no. These people are _bona fide_ married.
+_Tenez_--do you see that gentleman who is standing so assiduously near
+the chair of Madame de S----? He who is all attention and smiles to the
+lady?" "Certainly--his politeness is even affectionate." "Well it ought
+to be, for it is M. de S----_, her husband." "They are a happy couple,
+then." "_Hors de doute--he meets her at _soirees_ and balls; is the pink
+of politeness; puts on her shawl; sees her safe into her carriage,
+and--" "Then they drive home together, as loving as Darby and Joan."
+"And then he jumps into his cabriolet, and drives to the lodgings of
+----. _Bon soir_, Monsieur;--you are making me fall into the vulgar
+crime of scandal."
+
+Now, as much as all this may sound like invention, it is quite true,
+that I repeat no more to you than was said to me, and no more than what
+I believe to be exact. As respects the latter couple, I have been
+elsewhere told that they literally never see each other, except in
+public, where they constantly meet, as the best friends in the world.
+
+I was lately in some English society, when Lady G---- bet a pair of
+gloves with Lord R---- that he had not seen Lady R---- in a fortnight.
+The bet was won by the gentleman, who proved satisfactorily that he had
+met his wife at a dinner-party, only ten days before.
+
+After all I have told you, and all that you may have heard from others,
+I am nevertheless inclined to believe, that the high society of Paris is
+quite as exemplary as that of any other large European town. If we are
+any better ourselves, is it not more owing to the absence of temptation,
+than to any other cause? Put large garrisons into our towns, fill the
+streets with idlers, who have nothing to do but to render themselves
+agreeable, and with women with whom dress and pleasure are the principal
+occupations, and then let us see what protestantism and liberty will
+avail us, in this particular. The intelligent French say that their
+society is improving in morals. I can believe this, of which I think
+there is sufficient proof by comparing the present with the past, as the
+latter has been described to us. By the past, I do not mean the period
+of the revolution, when vulgarity assisted to render vice still more
+odious--a happy union, perhaps, for those who were to follow--but the
+days of the old _regime_. Chance has thrown me in the way of three or
+four old dowagers of that period, women of high rank, and still in the
+first circles, who, amid all their _finesse_ of breeding, and ease of
+manner, have had a most desperate _roue_ air about them. Their very
+laugh, at times, has seemed replete with a bold levity, that was as
+disgusting as it was unfeminine. I have never, in any other part of the
+world, seen loose sentiments _affiches_ with more effrontery. These
+women are the complete antipodes of the quiet, elegant Princesse de
+----, who was at Lady ---- ----'s, this evening; though some of them
+write _Princesses_ on their cards, too.
+
+The influence of a court must be great on the morals of those who live
+in its purlieus. Conversing with the Duc de ----, a man who has had
+general currency in the best society of Europe, on this subject, he
+said, --"England has long decried our manners. Previously to the
+revolution, I admit they were bad; perhaps worst than her own; but I
+know nothing in our history as bad as what I lately witnessed in
+England. You know I was there quite recently. The king invited me to
+dine at Windsor. I found every one in the drawing-room, but His Majesty
+and Lady ----. She entered but a minute before him, like a queen. Her
+reception was that of a queen; young, unmarried females kissed her hand.
+Now, all this might happen in France, even now: but Louis XV. the most
+dissolute of our monarchs, went no farther. At Windsor, I saw the
+husband, sons, and daughters of the favourite, in the circle! _Le parc
+des Cerfs_ was not as bad as this."
+
+"And yet, M. de ----, since we are conversing frankly, listen to what I
+witnessed, but the other day, in France. You know the situation of
+things at St. Ouen, and the rumours that are so rife. We had the _Fete
+Dieu_, during my residence there. You, who are a Catholic, need not be
+told that your sect believe in the doctrine of the 'real presence.'
+There was a _reposoir_ erected in the garden of the chateau, and God, in
+person, was carried, with religious pomp, to rest in the bowers of the
+ex-favourite. It is true, the husband was not present: he was only in
+the provinces!"
+
+"The influence of a throne makes sad parasites and hypocrites," said M.
+de ----, shrugging his shoulders.
+
+"And the influence of the people, too, though in a different way. A
+courtier is merely a well-dressed demagogue."
+
+"It follows, then, that man is just a poor devil."
+
+But I am gossiping away with you, when my Asmodean career is ended, and
+it is time I went to bed. Good night!
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XIX.
+
+Garden of the Tuileries.--The French Parliament.--Parliamentary
+Speakers.--The Tribune.--Royal Initiative.--The Charter.--Mongrel
+Government.--Ministerial Responsibility.--Elections in
+France.--Doctrinaires.--Differences of Opinion.--Controversy.
+
+
+TO JACOB SUTHERLAND, ESQ. NEW YORK.
+
+The Chambers have been opened with the customary ceremonies and parade.
+It is usual for the king, attended by a brilliant _cortege_, to go, on
+these occasions, from the Tuileries to the Palais Bourbon, through lines
+of troops, under a salute of guns. The French love _spectacles_, and
+their monarch, if he would be popular, is compelled to make himself one,
+at every plausible opportunity.
+
+The garden of the Tuileries is a parallelogram, of, I should think,
+fifty acres, of which one end is bounded by the palace. It has a high
+vaulted terrace on the side next the river, as well as at the opposite
+end, and one a little lower, next the Rue de Rivoli. There is also a
+very low broad terrace, immediately beneath the windows of the palace,
+which separates the buildings from the parterres. You will understand
+that the effect of this arrangement is to shut out the world from the
+persons in the garden, by means of the terraces, and, indeed, to enable
+them, by taking refuge in the woods that fill quite half the area, to
+bury themselves almost in a forest. The public has free access to this
+place, from an early hour in the morning to eight or nine at night,
+according to the season. When it is required to clear them, a party of
+troops marches, by beat of drum, from the chateau, through the great
+_allee_, to the lower end of the garden. This is always taken as the
+signal to disperse, and the world begins to go out, at the different
+gates. It is understood that the place is frequently used as a
+promenade, by the royal family, after this hour, especially in the fine
+season; but, as it would be quite easy for any one, evilly disposed, to
+conceal himself among the trees, statues, and shrubs, the troops are
+extended in very open order, and march slowly back to the palace, of
+course driving every one before them. Each gate is locked, as the line
+passes it.
+
+The only parts of the garden, which appear, on the exterior, to be on a
+level with the street, though such is actually the fact with the whole
+of the interior, are the great gate opposite the palace, and a side gate
+near its southern end; the latter being the way by which one passes out,
+to cross the Pont Royal.
+
+In attempting to pass in at this gate the other morning, for the first
+time, at that hour, I found it closed. A party of ladies and gentlemen
+were walking on the low terrace, beneath the palace windows, and a
+hundred people might have been looking at them from without. A second
+glance showed me, that among some children, were the heir presumptive,
+and his sister Mademoiselle d'Artois. The exhibition could merely be an
+attempt to feel the public pulse, for the country-house of La Bagatelle,
+to which the children go two or three times a week, is much better
+suited to taking the air. I could not believe in the indifference that
+was manifested, had I not seen it. The children are both engaging,
+particularly the daughter, and yet these innocent and perfectly
+inoffensive beings were evidently regarded more with aversion than with
+affection.
+
+The display of the opening of the session produced no more effect on the
+public mind, than the appearance on the terrace of _les Enfans de
+France_. The Parisians are the least loyal of Charles's subjects, and
+though the troops, and a portion of the crowd, cried "Vive le Roi!" it
+was easy to see that the disaffected were more numerous than the
+well-affected.
+
+I have attended some of the sittings since the opening, and shall now
+say a word on the subject of the French Parliamentary proceedings. The
+hall is an amphitheatre, like our own; the disposition of the seats and
+speaker's chair being much the same as at Washington. The members sit on
+benches, however, that rise one behind the other, and through which they
+ascend and descend, by aisles. These aisles separate the different
+shades of opinion, for those who think alike sit together. Thus the
+_gauche_ or left is occupied by the extreme liberals; the _centre
+gauche_, by those who are a shade nearer the Bourbons. The _centre
+droit_, or right centre, by the true Bourbonists, and so on, to the
+farthest point of the semi-circle. Some of the members affect even to
+manifest the minuter shades of their opinions by their relative
+positions in their own sections, and I believe it is usual for each one
+to occupy his proper place.
+
+You probably know that the French members speak from a stand immediately
+beneath the chair of the president, called a tribune. Absurd as this may
+seem, I believe it to be a very useful regulation, the vivacity of the
+national character rendering some such check on loquacity quite
+necessary. Without it, a dozen would often be on their feet at once; as
+it is, even, this sometimes happens. No disorder that ever occurs in our
+legislative bodies, will give you any just notion of that which
+frequently occurs here. The president rings a bell as a summons to keep
+order, and as a last resource he puts on his hat, a signal that the
+sitting is suspended.
+
+The speaking of both chambers is generally bad. Two-thirds of the
+members read their speeches, which gives the sitting a dull, monotonous
+character, and, as you may suppose, the greater part of their lectures
+are very little attended to. The most parliamentary speaker is M. Royer
+Collard, who is, just now, so popular that he has been returned for
+seven different places at the recent election.
+
+M. Constant is an exceedingly animated speaker, resembling in this
+particular Mr. M'Duffie. M. Constant, however, has a different motion
+from the last gentleman, his movement being a constant oscillation over
+the edge of the tribune, about as fast, and almost as regular, as that
+of the pendulum of a large clock. It resembles that of a sawyer in the
+Mississippi. General Lafayette speaks with the steadiness and calm that
+you would expect from his character, and is always listened to with
+respect. Many professional men speak well, and exercise considerable
+influence in the house; for here, as elsewhere, the habit of public and
+extemporaneous speaking gives an immediate ascendency in deliberative
+bodies.
+
+Some of the scenes one witnesses in the Chamber of Deputies are amusing
+by their exceeding vivacity. The habit of crying "Ecoutez!" prevails, as
+in the English parliament, though the different intonations of that cry
+are not well understood. I have seen members run at the tribune, like
+children playing puss in a corner; and, on one occasion, I saw five
+different persons on its steps, in waiting for the descent of the member
+in possession. When a great question is to be solemnly argued, the
+members inscribe their names for the discussion, and are called on to
+speak in the order in which they stand on the list.
+
+The French never sit in committee of the whole, but they have adopted in
+its place an expedient, that gives power more control over the
+proceedings of the two houses. At the commencement of the session, the
+members draw for their numbers in the _bureaux_, as they are called. Of
+these _bureaux_, there are ten or twelve, and, as a matter of course,
+they include all the members. As soon as the numbers are drawn, the
+members assemble in their respective rooms, and choose their officers; a
+president and secretary. These elections are always supposed to be
+indicative of the political tendency of each _bureau_; those which have
+a majority of liberals, choosing officers of their own opinions, and
+_vice versa_. These _bureaux_ are remodelled, periodically, by drawing
+anew; the term of duration being a month or six weeks. I believe the
+chamber retains the power to refer questions, or not, to these
+_bureaux_; their institution being no more than a matter of internal
+regulation, and not of constitutional law. It is, however, usual to send
+all important laws to them, where they are discussed and voted on; the
+approbation of a majority of the _bureaux_ being, in such cases,
+necessary for their reception in the chambers.
+
+The great evil of the present system is the initiative of the king. By
+this reservation in the charter, the crown possesses more than a veto,
+all laws actually emanating from the sovereign. The tendency of such a
+regulation is either to convert the chambers into the old _lits de
+justice_, or to overthrow the throne, an event which will certainly
+accompany any serious change here. As might have been, as _would_ have
+been anticipated, by any one familiar with the action of legislative
+bodies, in our time, this right is already so vigorously assailed, as to
+give rise to constant contentions between the great powers of the state.
+All parties are agreed that no law can be presented, that does not come
+originally from the throne; but the liberals are for putting so wide a
+construction on the right to amend, as already to threaten to pervert
+the regulation. This has driven some of the Bourbonists to maintain that
+the chambers have no right, at all, to amend a royal proposition. Any
+one may foresee, that this is a state of things which cannot peaceably
+endure for any great length of time. The ministry are compelled to pack
+the chambers, and in order to effect their objects, they resort to all
+the expedients of power that offer. As those who drew up the charter had
+neither the forethought, nor the experience, to anticipate all the
+embarrassments of a parliamentary government, they unwittingly committed
+themselves, and illegal acts are constantly resorted to, in order that
+the system may be upheld. The charter was bestowed _ad captandum_, and
+is a contradictory _melange_ of inexpedient concessions and wily
+reservations. The conscription undermined the popularity of Napoleon,
+and Louis XVIII. in his charter says, "The conscription is abolished;
+the _recruiting_ for the army and navy shall be settled by a law." Now
+the conscription _is not_ abolished; but, if pushed on this point, a
+French jurist would perhaps tell you it is _now_ established by law. The
+feudal exclusiveness, on the subject of taxation, is done away with, all
+men being equally liable to taxation. The nett pay of the army is about
+two sous a day; _this_ is settled by law, passed by the representatives
+of those who pay two hundred francs a year, in direct taxation. The
+conscription, in appearance, is general and fair enough; but he who has
+money can always hire a substitute, at a price quite within his power.
+It is only the poor man, who is never in possession of one or two
+thousand francs, that is obliged to serve seven years at two sous a day,
+nett.
+
+France has gained, beyond estimate, by the changes from the old to the
+present system, but it is in a manner to render further violent changes
+necessary. I say _violent_, for political changes are everywhere
+unavoidable, since questions of polity are, after all, no other than
+questions of facts, and these are interests that will regulate
+themselves, directly or indirectly. The great desideratum of a
+government, after settling its principles in conformity with controlling
+facts, is to secure to itself the means of progressive change, without
+the apprehension of convulsion. Such is not the case with France, and
+further revolutions are inevitable. The mongrel government which exists,
+neither can stand, nor does it deserve to stand. It contains the seeds
+of its own destruction. Here, you will be told, that the King is a
+Jesuit, that he desires to return to the ancient regime, and that the
+opposition wishes merely to keep him within the limits of the charter.
+My own observations lead to a very different conclusion. The difficulty
+is in the charter itself, which leaves the government neither free nor
+despotic; in short, without any distinctive character.
+
+This defect is so much felt, that, in carrying out the details of the
+system, much that properly belongs to it has been studiously omitted.
+The king can do no wrong, here, as in England, but the ministers are
+responsible. By way of making a parade of this responsibility, every
+official act of the king is countersigned by the minister of the proper
+department, and, by the theory of the government, that particular
+minister is responsible for that particular act. Now, by the charter,
+the peers are the judges of political crimes. By the charter, also, it
+is stipulated that no one can be proceeded against except in cases
+expressly provided for by law and in the _forms_ prescribed by the law.
+You will remember that, all the previous constitutions being declared
+illegal, Louis XVIII. dates his reign from the supposed death of Louis
+XVII. and that there are no fundamental precedents that may be drawn in
+to aid the constructions, but that the charter must be interpreted by
+its own provisions. It follows, then, as a consequence, that no minister
+can be legally punished until a law is enacted to dictate the
+punishment, explain the offences, and point out the forms of procedure.
+Now, no such law has ever been proposed, and although the chambers may
+_recommend_ laws to the king, they must await his pleasure in order even
+to discuss them openly, and enlist the public feeling in their behalf.
+The responsibility of the ministers was proposed _ad captandum_, like
+the abolition of the conscription, but neither has been found convenient
+in practice.[27]
+
+[Footnote 27: When the ministers of Charles X. were tried, it was without
+law, and they would probably have escaped punishment altogether, on this
+plea, had not the condition of the public mind required a concession.]
+
+
+The electors of France are said to be between eighty and one hundred
+thousand. The qualifications of a deputy being much higher than those of
+an elector, it is computed that the four hundred and fifty members must
+be elected from among some four or five thousand available candidates.
+It is not pretended that France does not contain more than this number
+of individuals who pay a thousand francs a year in direct taxes, for
+taxation is so great that this sum is soon made up; but a deputy must be
+forty years old, a regulation which at once excludes fully one half the
+men, of itself; and then it will be recollected that many are
+superannuated, several hundreds are peers, others cannot quit their
+employments, etc. etc. I have seen the number of available candidates
+estimated as low, even, as three thousand.
+
+The elections in France are conducted in a mode peculiar to the nation.
+The electors of the highest class have two votes, or for representatives
+of two descriptions. This plan was an after-thought of the king, for the
+original charter contains no such regulation, but the munificent father
+of the national liberties saw fit, subsequently, to qualify his gift.
+Had Louis XVIII. lived a little longer, he would most probably have been
+dethroned before this; the hopes and expectations which usually
+accompany a new reign having, most probably, deferred the crisis for a
+few years. The electors form themselves into colleges, into which no one
+who is not privileged to vote is admitted. This is a good regulation,
+and might be copied to advantage at home. A law prescribing certain
+limits around each poll, and rendering it penal for any but those
+authorized to vote at that particular poll, to cross it, would greatly
+purify our elections. The government, here, appoints the presiding
+officer of each electoral college, and the selection is always carefully
+made of one in the interests of the ministry; though in what manner such
+a functionary can influence the result, is more than I can tell you. It
+is, however, thought to be favourable to an individual's own election to
+get this nomination. The vote is by ballot, though the charter secures
+no such privilege. Indeed that instrument is little more than a
+declaration of rights, fortified by a few general constituent laws.
+
+The same latitude exists here, in the constructions of the charter, as
+exists at home, in the constructions of the constitution. The French
+have, however, one great advantage over us, in daring to think for
+themselves; for, though there is a party of _doctrinaires_, who wish to
+imitate England, too, it is neither a numerous nor a strong party. These
+_doctrinaires_, as the name implies, are men who wish to defer to
+theories, rather than facts; a class that is to be found all over the
+world. For obvious reasons, the English system has admirers throughout
+Europe, as well as in America, since nothing can be more agreeable, for
+those who are in a situation to look forward to such an advantage, than
+to see themselves elevated into, as Lafayette expresses, so many "little
+legitimacies." The peerage, with its exclusive and hereditary benefits,
+is the aim of all the nobility of Europe, and wishes of this sort make
+easy converts to any philosophy that may favour the desire.
+
+One meets, here, with droll evidences of the truth of what I have just
+told you. I have made the acquaintance of a Russian of very illustrious
+family, and he has always been loud and constant in his eulogiums of
+America and her liberty. Alluding to the subject, the other day, he
+amused me by _naively_ observing, "Ah, you are a happy people--you are
+_free_--and so are the _English_. Now, in Russia, all rank depends on
+the commission one bears in the army, or on the will of the Emperor. I
+am a Prince; my father was a Prince; my grandfather, too; but it is of
+no avail. I get no privileges by my birth; whereas, in England, where I
+have been, it is so different--And I dare say it is different in
+America, too?" I told him it was, indeed, "very different in America."
+He sighed, and seemed to envy me.
+
+The party of the _doctrinaires_ is the one that menaces the most serious
+evil to France. It is inherently the party of aristocracy; and, in a
+country as far advanced as France, it is the combinations of the few,
+that, after all, are most to be apprehended. The worst of it is, that,
+in countries where abuses have so long existed, the people get to be so
+disqualified for entertaining free institutions, that even the
+disinterested and well-meaning are often induced to side with the
+rapacious and selfish, to prevent the evils of reaction.
+
+In a country so much inclined to speculate, to philosophize, and to
+reason on everything, it is not surprising that a fundamental law, as
+vaguely expressed as the charter, should leave ample room for
+discussion. We find that our own long experience in these written
+instruments does not protect us from violent differences of opinion,
+some of which are quite as extravagant as any that exist here, though
+possibly less apt to lead to as grave consequences.[28]
+
+[Footnote 28: The discussion which grew out of the law to protect
+American industry, affords a singular instance of the manner in which
+clever men can persuade themselves and others into any notion, however
+extravagant. The uncouth doctrine of nullification turned on the
+construction that might be put on the intimacy of the relations created
+by the Union, and on the nature of the sovereignties of the states.
+
+Because the constitution commences with a declaration, that it is formed
+and adopted by "we the people of the United States," overlooking, not
+only all the facts of the case, but misconceiving the very meaning of
+the words they quote, one party virtually contended, that the instrument
+was formed by a consolidated nation. On this point their argument,
+certainly sustained in part by unanswerable truth, mainly depends.
+
+The word "people" has notoriously several significations. It means a
+"population;" it means the "vulgar;" it means any particular portion of
+a population, as, "rich people," "poor people," "mercantile people,"
+etc. etc. In a political sense, it has always been understood to mean
+that portion of the population of a country, which is possessed of
+_political rights_. On this sense, then, it means a _constituency_ in a
+representative government, and so it has always been understood in
+England, and is understood to-day in France. When a question is referred
+to the "people" at an election in England, it is not referred to a tithe
+of the population, but to a particular portion of it. In South Carolina
+and Louisiana, in the popular sense of Mr. Webster, there is no "people"
+to refer to, a majority of the men of both states possessing no civil
+rights, and scarcely having civil existence. Besides, "people," in its
+broad signification, includes men, women, and children, and no one will
+contend, that the two latter had anything to do with the formation of
+our constitution. It follows, then, that the term has been used in a
+limited sense, and we must look to incidental facts to discover its
+meaning.
+
+The convention was chosen, not by any common constituency, but by the
+constituencies of the several states, which, at that time, embraced
+every gradation between a democratical and an aristocratically polity.
+Thirteen states existed in 1787, and yet the constitution was to go into
+effect when it was adopted by any nine of them. It will not be pretended
+that this decision would be binding on the other four, and yet it is
+possible that these four dissenting states should contain more than half
+of all the population of the confederation. It would be very easy to put
+a proposition, in which it might be demonstrated arithmetically, that
+the constitution could have been adopted against a considerable majority
+of whole numbers. In the face of such a fact, it is folly to suppose the
+term "people" is used in any other than a conventional sense. It is well
+known, in addition to the mode of its adoption, that every provision of
+the constitution can be altered, with a single exception, by
+three-fourths of the states. Perhaps more than half of the entire
+population (excluding the Territories and the District), is in six of
+the largest states, at this moment. But whether this be so or not, such
+a combination could easily he made, as would demonstrate that less than
+a third of the population of the country can at any time alter the
+constitution.
+
+It is probable that the term "we the people," was used in a sort of
+contradistinction to the old implied right of the sovereignty of the
+king, just as we idly substituted the words "God save the people" at the
+end of a proclamation, for "God save the king." It was a form. But, if
+it is desirable to affix to them any more precise signification, it will
+not do to generalize according to the argument of one party; but we are
+to take the words, in their limited and appropriate meaning and with
+their accompanying facts. They can only allude to the constituencies,
+and these constituencies existed only _through_ the states, and were as
+varied as their several systems. If the meaning of the term "we the
+people" was misconceived, it follows that the argument which was drawn
+from the error was worthless. The constitution of the United States was
+not formed by the _people_ of the United States, but by such a portion
+of them as it suited the several states to invest with political powers,
+and under such combinations as gave the decision to anything but a
+majority of the nation. In other words, the constitution was certainly
+formed by the _states_ as _political bodies_, and without any necessary
+connexion with any general or uniform system of polity.
+
+Any theory based on the separate sovereignties of the states, has, on
+the other hand, a frail support. The question was not _who_ formed the
+constitution, but _what_ was formed. All the great powers of
+sovereignty, such as foreign relations, the right to treat, make war and
+peace, to control commerce, to coin money, etc. etc. are expressly
+ceded. But these are not, after all, the greatest blows that are given
+to the doctrine of reserved sovereignty. A power to _alter_ the
+constitution, as has just been remarked, has been granted, by which even
+the _dissenting states_ have become bound. The only right reserved, is
+that of the equal representation in the senate, and it would follow,
+perhaps, as a legitimate consequence, the preservation of the
+confederated polity; but South Carolina could, under the theory of the
+constitution, be stripped of her right to control nearly every social
+interest; every man, woman and child in the state dissenting. It is
+scarcely worth while to construct a sublimated theory, on the
+sovereignty of a community so situated by the legitimate theory of the
+government under which it actually exists!
+
+No means can be devised, that will always protect the weak from the
+aggressions of the strong, under the forms of law; and nature has
+pointed out the remedy, when the preponderance of good is against
+submission; but one cannot suppress his expression of astonishment, at
+finding any respectable portion of a reasoning community, losing sight
+of this simple and self-evident truth, to uphold a doctrine as weak as
+that of nullification, viewed as a legal remedy.
+
+If the American statesmen (_quasi_ and real) would imitate the good
+curate and the bachelor of Don Quixote, by burning all the political
+heresies, with which their libraries, not to say their brains, are now
+crammed, and set seriously about studying the terms and the nature of
+the national compact, without reference to the notions of men who had no
+connexion with the country, the public would be the gainers, and
+occasionally one of them might stand a chance of descending to posterity
+in some other light than that of the mere leader of a faction.]
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XX.
+
+Excursion with Lafayette.--Vincennes.--The Donjon.--Lagrange.--The
+Towers.--Interior of the House--the General's Apartments.--the Cabinet.
+--Lafayette's Title.--Church of the Chateau.--Ruins of Vivier.--Roman
+Remains.--American Curiosity.--The Table at Lagrange.--Swindling.
+
+
+To R. COOPER, ESQ. COOPERSTOWN.
+
+I have said nothing to you of Lagrange, though I have now been there no
+less than three times. Shortly after our arrival in Paris, General
+Lafayette had the kindness to send us an invitation; but we were
+deterred from going for sometime, by the indisposition of one of the
+family. In the autumn of 1826, I went, however, alone; in the spring I
+went again, carrying Mrs. ---- with me; and I have now just returned from
+a third visit, in which I went with my wife, accompanied by one or two
+more of the family.
+
+It is about twenty-seven miles from Paris to Rosay, a small town that is
+a league from the castle. This is not a post-route, the great road
+ending at Rosay, and we were obliged to go the whole distance with the
+same horses. Paris is left by the Boulevard de la Bastille, the Barriere
+du Trone, and the chateau and woods of Vincennes. The second time I went
+into Brie, it was with the General himself, and in his own carriage. He
+showed me a small pavilion that is still standing in a garden near the
+old site of the Bastille, and which he told me, once belonged to the
+hotel that Beaumarchais inhabited, when in his glory, and in which
+pavilion this witty writer was accustomed to work. The roof was topped
+by a vane to show which way the wind blew; and, in pure _fanfaronnade_,
+or to manifest his contempt for principles, the author of "Figaro" had
+caused a large copper pen to do the duty of a weathercock; and there it
+stands to this day, a curious memorial equally of his wit and of his
+audacity.
+
+At the Barriere du Trone the General pointed out to me the spot where
+two of his female connexions suffered under the guillotine during the
+Reign of Terror. On one occasion, in passing, we entered the Castle of
+Vincennes, which is a sort of citadel for Paris, and which has served
+for a state prison since the destruction of the Bastille. Almost all of
+these strong old places were formerly the residences of the kings, or of
+great nobles, the times requiring that they should live constantly
+protected by ditches and walls.
+
+Vincennes, like the Tower of London, is a collection of old buildings,
+enclosed within a wall, and surrounded by a ditch. The latter, however,
+is dry. The most curious of the structures, and the one which gives the
+place its picturesque appearance, in the distance, is a cluster of
+exceedingly slender, tall, round towers, in which the prisoners are
+usually confined, and which is the _donjon_ of the hold. This building,
+which contains many vaulted rooms piled on each other, was formerly the
+royal abode; and it has, even now, a ditch of its own, though it stands
+within the outer walls of the place. There are many other high towers on
+the walls; and, until the reign of Napoleon, there were still more; but
+he caused them to be razed to the level of the walls, which of
+themselves are sufficiently high.
+
+The chapel is a fine building, being Gothic. It was constructed in the
+time of Charles V. There are also two or three vast _corps de batimens_,
+which are almost palaces in extent and design, though they are now used
+only as quarters for officers, etc. etc. The _donjon_ dates from the
+same reign. The first room in this building is called the "salle de la
+question," a name which sufficiently denotes its infernal use. That of
+the upper story is the room in which the kings of France formerly held
+their councils. The walls are sixteen feet thick, and the rooms are
+thirty feet high. As there are five stories, this _donjon_ cannot be
+less than a hundred and forty or fifty feet in elevation. The view from
+the summit is very extensive; though it is said that, in the time of
+Napoleon, a screen was built around the battlement, to prevent the
+prisoners, when they took the air, from enjoying it. As this conqueror
+was cruel from policy alone, it is probable this was merely a precaution
+against signals; for it is quite apparent, if he desired, to torment his
+captives, France has places better adapted to the object than even the
+_donjon_ of Vincennes. I am not his apologist, however; for, while I
+shall not go quite as far as the Englishman who maintained, in a
+laboured treatise, that Napoleon was the beast of the Revelations, I
+believe he was anything but a god.
+
+Vincennes was a favourite residence of St. Louis, and there is a
+tradition that he used to take his seat under a particular oak, in the
+adjoining forest, where, all who pleased were permitted to come before
+him, and receive justice from himself. Henry V. of England, died in the
+_donjon_ of Vincennes; and I believe his successor, Henry VI. was born
+in the same building. One gets a better notion of the state of things in
+the ages of feudality, by passing an hour in examining such a hold, than
+in a week's reading. After going through this habitation, and studying
+its barbarous magnificence, I feel much more disposed to believe that
+Shakspeare has not outraged probability in his dialogue between Henry
+and Catharine, than if I had never seen it, bad as that celebrated
+love-scene is.
+
+Shortly after quitting Vincennes the road crosses the Marne, and
+stretches away across a broad bottom. There is little of interest
+between Paris and Rosay. The principal house is that of Grosbois, which
+once belonged to Moreau, I believe, but is now the property of the
+Prince de Wagram, the young son of Berthier. The grounds are extensive,
+and the house is large, though I think neither in very good taste, at
+least, so far as one could judge in passing.
+
+There are two or three ruins on this road of some historical interest,
+but not of much beauty. There is usually a nakedness, unrelieved by
+trees or other picturesque accessories, about the French ruins, which
+robs them of half their beauty, and dirty, squalid hamlets and villages
+half the time come in to render the picture still less interesting.
+
+At Rosay another route is taken, and Lagrange is approached by the rear,
+after turning a small bit of wood. It is possible to see the tops of the
+towers for an instant, on the great road, before reaching the town.
+
+It is not certainly known in what age the chateau was built; but, from
+its form, and a few facts connected with its origin, whose dates are
+ascertained, it is thought to be about five hundred years old. It never
+was more than a second-rate building of its class, though it was clearly
+intended for a baronial hold. Originally, the name was Lagrange en Brie;
+but by passing into a new family, it got the appellation of Lagrange
+Bleneau, by which it is known at present. You are sufficiently familiar
+with French to understand that _grange_ means barn or granary, and that
+a liberal translation would make it Bleneau Farm.
+
+In 1399 a marriage took place between the son of the lord of Lagrange en
+Brie with a daughter of a branch of the very ancient and great family of
+Courtenay, which had extensive possessions, at that time, in Brie. It
+was this marriage which gave the new name to the castle, the estate in
+consequence passing into the line of Courtenay-Bleneau. In 1595, the
+property, by another marriage with an heiress, passed into the
+well-known family D'Aubussons, Comtes de la Feuillade. The first
+proprietor of this name was the grandfather of the Mareschal de la
+Feuillade, the courtier who caused the Place des Victoires to be
+constructed at Paris; and he appropriated the revenues of the estate,
+which, in 1686, were valued at nine thousand francs, to the support and
+completion of his work of flattery. The property at that time was,
+however, much more extensive than it is at present. The son of this
+courtier dying without issue, in 1726, the estate was purchased by M.
+Dupre, one of the judges of France.
+
+With this magistrate commences, I believe, the connexion of the
+ancestors of the Lafayettes with the property. The only daughter married
+M. d'Aguesseau; and her daughter, again, married the Duc de
+Noailles-d'Ayen, [29] carrying with her, as a marriage portion, the lands
+of Fontenay, Lagrange, etc. etc., or, in other words, the ancient
+possessions of M. de Lafeuillade. The Marquis de Lafayette married one
+of the Mesdemoiselles de Noailles, while he was still a youth, and when
+the estate, after a short sequestration, was restored to the family,
+General Lafayette received the chateau of Lagrange, with some six or
+eight hundred acres of land around it, as his wife's portion.
+
+[Footnote 29: Mr. Adams, in his Eulogy on Lafayette, has called the Duc
+de Noailles, the first peer of France. The fact is of no great moment,
+but accuracy is always better than error. I believe the Duc de Noailles
+was the youngest of the old _ducs et pairs_ of France. The Duc d'Uzes, I
+have always understood, was the oldest.]
+
+Although the house is not very spacious for a chateau of the region in
+which it stands, it is a considerable edifice, and one of the most
+picturesque I have seen in this country. The buildings stand on three
+sides of an irregular square. The fourth side must have been either a
+high wall or a range of low offices formerly, to complete the court and
+the defences, but every vestige of them has long since been removed. The
+ditch, too, which originally encircled the whole castle, has been filled
+in, on two sides, though still remaining on the two others, and greatly
+contributing to the beauty of the place, as the water is living, and is
+made to serve the purposes of a fishpond. We had carp from it, for
+breakfast, the day after our arrival.
+
+Lagrange is constructed of hewn stone, of a good greyish colour, and in
+parts of it there are some respectable pretensions to architecture. I
+think it probable that one of its fronts has been rebuilt, the style
+being so much better than the rest of the structure. There are five
+towers, all of which are round, and have the plain, high, pyramidal
+roof, so common in France. They are without cornices, battlements of any
+sort, or, indeed, any relief to the circular masonry. One, however, has
+a roof of a square form, though the exterior of the lower itself is, at
+least in part, round. All the roofs are of slate.
+
+The approach to the castle is circuitous, until quite near it, when the
+road enters a little thicket of evergreens, crosses a bridge, and passes
+beneath an arch to the court, which is paved. The bridge is now
+permanent, though there was once a draw, and the grooves of a portcullis
+are still visible beneath the arch. The shortest side of the square is
+next the bridge, the building offering here but little more than the two
+towers, and the room above the gateway. One of these towers forms the
+end of this front of the castle, and the other is, of course, at an
+angle. On the exterior, they are both buried in ivy, as well as the
+building which connects them. This ivy was planted by Charles Fox, who,
+in company with General Fitzpatrick, visited Lagrange, after the peace
+of Amiens. The windows, which are small and irregular on this side, open
+beautifully through the thick foliage, and as this is the part of the
+structure that is occupied by the children of the family, their blooming
+faces thrust through the leafy apertures have a singularly pleasing
+effect. The other three towers stand, one near the centre of the
+principal _corps de batiment_, one at the other angle, and the third at
+the end of the wing opposite that of the gate. The towers vary in size,
+and are all more or less buried in the walls, though still so distinct
+as greatly to relieve the latter, and everywhere to rise above them. On
+the open side of the court there is no ditch, but the ground, which is
+altogether park-like, and beautifully arranged, falls away, dotted with
+trees and copses, towards a distant thicket.
+
+Besides the _rez-de-chaussee_, which is but little above the ground,
+there are two good stories all round the building, and even more in the
+towers. The dining-room and offices are below, and there is also a small
+oratory, or chapel, though I believe none of the family live there. The
+entrance to the principal apartments is opposite the gate, and there is
+also here an exterior door which communicates directly with the lawn,
+the ditch running behind the other wing, and in front of the gate only.
+The great staircase is quite good, being spacious, easy of ascent, and
+of marble, with a handsome iron railing. It was put there by the mother
+of Madame Lafayette, I believe, and the General told me, it was nearly
+the only thing of value that he found among the fixtures, on taking
+possession. It had escaped injury.
+
+I should think the length of the house on the side of the square which
+contains the staircase might be ninety feet, including the tower at the
+end, and the tower at the angle; and perhaps the side which contains the
+offices may be even a little longer; though this will also include the
+same tower in the same angle, as well as the one at the opposite corner;
+while the side in which is the gateway can scarcely exceed sixty feet.
+If my estimates, which are merely made by the eye, are correct,
+including the towers, this would give an outside wall of two hundred and
+fifty feet, in circuit. Like most French buildings, the depth is
+comparatively much less. I question if the outer drawing-room is more
+than eighteen feet wide, though it is near thirty long. This room has
+windows on the court and on the lawn, and is the first apartment one
+enters after ascending the stairs. It communicates with the inner
+drawing-room, which is in the end tower of this side of the chateau, is
+quite round, of course, and may be twenty feet in diameter.
+
+The General's apartments are on the second floor. They consist of his
+bed-room, a large cabinet, and the library. The latter is in the tower
+at the angle, on the side of the staircase. It is circular, and from its
+windows overlooks the moat, which is beautifully shaded by willows and
+other trees. It contains a respectable collection of books, besides
+divers curiosities.
+
+The only bed-rooms I have occupied are, one in the tower, immediately
+beneath the library, and the other in the side tower, or the only one
+which does not stand at an angle, or at an end of the building. I
+believe, however, that the entire edifice, with the exception of the
+oratory, the offices, the dining-room, which is a large apartment on the
+_rez-de-chaussee_, the two drawing-rooms, two or three cabinets, and the
+library, and perhaps a family-room or two, such as a school-room,
+painting-room, etc., is subdivided into sleeping apartments, with the
+necessary cabinets and dressing-rooms. Including the family, I have
+known thirty people to be lodged in the house, besides servants, and I
+should think it might even lodge more. Indeed its hospitality seems to
+know no limits, for every newcomer appears to be just as welcome as all
+the others.
+
+The cabinet of Lafayette communicates with the library, and I passed
+much of the time during our visit, alone with him, in these two rooms. I
+may say that this was the commencement of a confidence with which he has
+since continued to treat me, and of a more intimate knowledge of the
+amiable features and simple integrity of his character, that has greatly
+added to my respect. No one can be pleasanter in private, and he is full
+of historical anecdotes, that he tells with great simplicity, and
+frequently with great humour. The cabinet contains many portraits, and,
+among others, one of Madame de Stael, and one of his own father. The
+former I am assured is exceedingly like; it is not the resemblance of a
+very fascinating woman. In the latter I find more resemblance to some of
+the grandchildren than to the son, although there is something about the
+shape of the head that is not unlike that of Lafayette's.
+
+General Lafayette never knew his father, who was killed, when he was
+quite an infant, at the battle of Minden. I believe the general was an
+only child, for I have never heard him speak of any brother or sister,
+nor indeed of any relative at all, as I can remember, on his own side,
+though he often alludes to the connexions he made by his marriage. I
+asked him how his father happened to be styled the _Comte_ de Lafayette,
+and he to be called the _Marquis_. He could not tell me: his grandfather
+was the _Marquis_ de Lafayette, his father the _Comte_, and he again was
+termed the _Marquis_. "I know very little about it," said be, "beyond
+this: I found myself a little _Marquis_, as I grew to know anything, and
+boys trouble themselves very little about such matters; and then I soon
+got tired of the name after I went to America. I cannot explain all the
+foolish distinctions of the feudal times, but I very well remember that
+when I was quite a boy, I had the honour to go through the ceremony of
+appointing the _cure_ of a very considerable town in Auvergne, of which
+I was the Seigneur. My conscience has been quite easy about the
+nomination, however, as my guardians must answer for the sin, if there
+be any."
+
+I was at a small dinner given by the Comte de Segur, just before we went
+to Lagrange, and at which General Lafayette and M. Alexander de Lameth
+were also guests. The three had served in America, all of them having
+been colonels while little more than boys. In the course of the
+conversation, M. de Lameth jokingly observed that the Americans paid the
+greater deference to General Lafayette because he was a _Marquis_. For a
+long time there had been but one Marquis in England (Lord Rockingham),
+and the colonist appreciating all other Marquises by this standard, had
+at once thought they would do no less than make the Marquis de Lafayette
+a general. "As for myself, though I was the senior colonel, and (as I
+understood him to say) his superior in personal rank, I passed for
+nobody, because I was only a _chevalier._" This sally was laughed at, at
+the time, though there is something very unsettled in the use of those
+arbitrary personal distinctions on which the French formerly laid so
+much stress. I shall not attempt to explain them. I contented myself by
+whispering to M. de Lameth, that we certainly knew very little of such
+matters in America, but I questioned if we were ever so ignorant as to
+suppose there was only one _Marquis_ in France. On the contrary, we are
+little too apt to fancy every Frenchman a _Marquis_.
+
+There was formerly a regular parish church attached to the chateau,
+which is still standing. It is very small, and is within a short
+distance of the gateway. The congregation was composed solely of the
+inhabitants of the chateau, and the people of the farm. The church
+contains epitaphs and inscriptions in memory of three of the D'Aubussons
+whose hearts were buried here, viz. Leon, Comte de Lafeuillade, a
+lieutenant-general; Gabriel, Marquis de Montargis; and Paul D'Aubussons,
+a Knight of Malta; all of whom were killed young, in battle.
+
+The General has about three hundred and fifty acres in cultivation, and
+more than two in wood, pasture, and meadow. The place is in very
+excellent condition, and seems to be well attended to. I have galloped
+all over it, on a little filly belonging to one of the young gentlemen,
+and have found beauty and utility as nicely blended, as is often to be
+met with, even in England, the true country of _fermes ornees_, though
+the name is imported.
+
+The third day of our visit, we all drove three or four leagues across
+the country, to see an old ruin of a royal castle called Vivier. This
+name implies a pond, and sure enough we found the remains of the
+buildings in the midst of two or three pools of water. This has been a
+considerable house, the ruins being still quite extensive and rather
+pretty. It was originally the property of a great noble, but the kings
+of France were in possession of it, as early as the year 1300. Charles
+V. had a great affection for Vivier, and very materially increased its
+establishment. His son, Charles VI. who was at times deranged, was often
+confined here, and it was after his reign, and by means of the long wars
+that ravaged France, that the place came to be finally abandoned as a
+royal abode. Indeed, it is not easy to see why a king should ever have
+chosen this spot at all for his residence, unless it might be for the
+purpose of hunting, for even now it is in a retired, tame, and far from
+pleasant part of the country.
+
+There are the ruins of a fine chapel and of two towers of considerable
+interest, beside extensive fragments of more vulgar buildings. One of
+these towers, being very high and very slender, is a striking object;
+but, from its form and position, it was one of those narrow wells that
+were attached to larger towers, and which contained nothing but the
+stairs. They are commonly to be seen in the ruins of edifices built in
+the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, in France; and what is worthy
+of remark, in several instances, notwithstanding their slender forms, I
+have met with them standing, although their principals have nearly
+disappeared. I can only account for it, by supposing that their use and
+delicacy of form have required more than ordinary care in the
+construction.
+
+The ruins of Vivier belong to M. Parquin, a distinguished lawyer of
+Paris. This gentleman has a small country-house near by, and General
+Lafayette took us all to see him. We found him at home, and met, quite
+as a matter of course, with a polite reception. M. Parquin gave us much
+curious information about the ruin, and took us to see some of the
+subterraneous passages that he has caused to be opened.
+
+It is thought that some of these artificial caverns were prisons, and
+that others were intended merely as places for depositing stores. The
+one we entered was of beautiful masonry, vaulted with the nicest art,
+and seemed to communicate with the ruins although the outlet was in the
+open field, and some distance from the walls. It might have been
+intended for the double purpose of a store-house and an outlet; for it
+is rare to meet with a palace, or a castle, that has out, more or less,
+of these private means of entrance and retreat. The Tuileries is said to
+abound with them, and I have been shown the line of an under-ground
+passage, between that palace and one of the public hotels, which must be
+fully a quarter of a mile in length.
+
+Dulaure gives an extract from a report of the state of the Chateau of
+Vivier, made about the year 1700, with a view to know whether its
+conditions were such as to entitle the place to preserve certain of its
+privileges. In this document, the castle is described as standing in the
+centre of a marsh, surrounded by forest, and as so remote from all
+civilization, as to be nearly forgotten. This, it will be remembered, is
+the account of a royal abode, that stands within thirty miles of Paris.
+
+In the very heart of the French capital, are the remains of an extensive
+palace of one of the Roman Emperors, and yet it may be questioned if one
+in a thousand, of those who live within a mile of the spot, have the
+least idea of the origin of the buildings. I have inquired about it, in
+its immediate neighbourhood, and it was with considerable difficulty I
+could discover any one who even knew that there was such a ruin at all,
+in the street. The great number of similar objects, and the habit of
+seeing them daily, has some such effect on one, as the movement of a
+crowd in a public thoroughfare, where images pass so incessantly before
+the eye, as to leave no impression of their peculiarities. Were a
+solitary bison to scamper through the Rue St. Honore, the worthy
+Parisians would transmit an account of his exploits to their children's
+children, while the wayfarer on the prairies takes little heed of the
+flight of a herd.
+
+As we went to Lagrange, we stopped at a tavern, opposite to which was
+the iron gate of a small chateau. I asked the girl who was preparing our
+_gouter_, to whom the house belonged. "I am sorry I cannot tell you,
+sir," she answered; and then seeing suspicion in my face, she promptly
+added--"for, do you see, sir, I have only been here _six weeks_." Figure
+to yourself an American girl, set down opposite an iron gate, in the
+country, and how long do you imagine she would be ignorant of the
+owner's name? If the blood of those pious inquisitors, the puritans,
+were in her veins, she would know more, not only of the gate, but of its
+owner, his wife, his children, his means, his hopes, wishes, intentions
+and thoughts, than he ever knew himself, or would be likely to know. But
+if this prominent love of meddling must of necessity in its very nature
+lead to what is worse than contented ignorance, gossiping error, and a
+wrong estimate of our fellow-creatures, it has, at least, the advantage
+of keeping a people from falling asleep over their everyday facts. There
+is no question that the vulgar and low-bred propensity of conjecturing,
+meddling, combining, with their unavoidable companion, _inventing_,
+exist to a vice, among a portion of our people; but, on the other hand,
+it is extremely inconvenient when one is travelling, and wishes to know
+the points of the compass, as has happened to myself, if he should ask a
+full-grown woman whereabouts the sun rises in that neighbourhood, he is
+repulsed with the answer, that--"Monsieur ought to know that better than
+a poor garden-woman like me!"
+
+We returned to Paris, after a pleasant visit of three days at Lagrange,
+during which we had delightful weather, and altogether a most agreeable
+time. The habits of the family are very regular and simple, but the
+intercourse has the freedom and independence of a country-house. We were
+all in the circular drawing-room a little before ten, breakfast being
+served between ten and eleven. The table was French, the morning repast
+consisting of light dishes of meat, _compotes_, fruits, and sometimes
+_soupe au lait_, one of the simplest and best things for such a meal
+than can be imagined. As a compliment to us Americans, we had fish fried
+and broiled, but I rather think this was an innovation. Wine, to drink
+with water, as a matter of course, was on the table. The whole ended
+with a cup of _cafe au lait_. The morning then passed as each one saw
+fit. The young men went shooting, the ladies drove out, or read, or had
+a little music, while the general and myself were either walking about
+the farm, or were conversing in the library. We dined at six, as at
+Paris, and tea was made in the drawing-room about nine.
+
+I was glad to hear from General Lafayette, that the reports of Americans
+making demands on his purse, like so many other silly rumours that are
+circulated, merely because some one has fancied such a thing might be
+so, are untrue. On the contrary, he assures me that applications of this
+nature are very seldom made, and most of those that have been made have
+proved to come from Englishmen, who have thought they might swindle him
+in this form. I have had at least a dozen such applications myself, but
+I take it nothing is easier, in general, than to distinguish between an
+American and a native of Great Britain. It was agreed between us, that
+in future all applications of this nature should be sent to me for
+investigation.[30]
+
+[Footnote 30: Under this arrangement, two or three years later, an
+applicant was sent for examination, under very peculiar circumstances.
+The man represented himself to be a shopkeeper of Baltimore, who had
+come to England with his wife and child, to purchase goods. He had been
+robbed of all he had, according to his account of the matter, about a
+thousand pounds in sovereigns, and was reduced to want, in a strange
+country. After trying all other means in vain, he bethought him of
+coming to Paris, to apply to General Lafayette for succour. He had just
+money enough to do this, having left his wife in Liverpool. He appeared
+with an English passport, looked like an Englishman, and had even caught
+some of the low English idioms, such as, "I am agreeable," for "It is
+agreeable to me," or, "I agree to do so," etc. etc. The writer was
+exceedingly puzzled to decide as to this man's nationality. At length,
+in describing his journey to Paris, he said, "they took my passport from
+me, when we got _to the lines_." This settled the matter, as no one but
+an American would call a _frontier_ the _lines_. He proved, in the end,
+to be an American, and a great rogue.]
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XXI.
+
+Insecurity of the Bourbons.--Distrust of Americans.--Literary Visitor.
+--The Templars.--Presents and Invitations.--A Spy--American Virtue.
+--Inconsistency.--Social Freedom in America,--French Mannerists
+--National Distinctions.--A lively Reaction.
+
+
+To R. COOPER, ESQ. COOPERSTOWN.
+
+We all went to bed, a night or two since, as usual, and awoke to learn
+that there had been a fight in the capital. One of the countless
+underplots had got so near the surface, that it threw up smoke. It is
+said, that about fifty were killed and wounded, chiefly on the part of
+the populace.
+
+The insecurity of the Bourbons is little understood in America. It is
+little understood even by those Americans who pass a few months in the
+country, and in virtue of frequenting the _cafes_, and visiting the
+theatres, fancy they know the people. Louis XVIII. was more than once on
+the point of flying, again, between the year 1815 and his death; for
+since the removal of the allied troops, there is really no force for a
+monarch to depend on, more especially in and around the capital, the
+army being quite as likely to take sides against them as for them.
+
+The government has determined on exhibiting vigour, and there was a
+great show of troops the night succeeding the combat. Curious to see the
+effect of all this, two or three of us got into a carriage and drove
+through the streets, about nine o'clock. We found some two or three
+thousand men on the Boulevards, and the Rue St. Denis, in particular,
+which had been the scene of the late disorder, was watched with jealous
+caution. In all, there might have been four or five thousand men under
+arms. They were merely in readiness, leaving a free passage for
+carriages, though in some of the narrow streets we found the bayonets
+pretty near our faces.
+
+An American being supposed _ex officio_, as it were, to be a well-wisher
+to the popular cause, there is, perhaps, a slight disposition to look at
+us with distrust. The opinion of our _travellers'_ generally favouring
+liberty is, in my judgment, singularly erroneous, the feelings of a
+majority being, on the whole, just the other way, for, at least, the
+first year or two of their European experience; though, I think, it is
+to be noticed, by the end of that time, that they begin to lose sight of
+the personal interests which, at home, have made them anything but
+philosophers on such subjects, and to see and appreciate the immense
+advantages of freedom over exclusion, although the predominance of the
+former may not always favour their own particular views. Such, at least,
+has been the result of my own observations, and so far from considering
+a fresh arrival from home, as being likely to be an accession to our
+little circle of liberal principles, I have generally deemed all such
+individuals as being more likely to join the side of the aristocrats or
+the exclusionists in politics. This is not the moment to enter into an
+examination of the causes that have led to so singular a contradiction
+between opinions and facts, though I think the circumstance is not to be
+denied, for it is now my intention to give you an account of the manner
+in which matters are managed here, rather than enter into long
+investigations of the state of society at home.
+
+Not long after my arrival in France, a visit was announced, from a
+person who was entirely unknown to me, but who called himself a
+_litterateur_. The first interview passed off as such interviews usually
+do, and circumstances not requiring any return on my part, it was soon
+forgotten. Within a fortnight, however, I received visit the second,
+when the conversation took a political turn, my guest freely abusing the
+Bourbons, the aristocrats, and the present state of things in France. I
+did little more than listen. When the way was thus opened, I was asked
+if I admired Sir Walter Scott, and particularly what I thought of
+Ivanhoe, or, rather, if I did not think it an indifferent book. A little
+surprised at such a question, I told my _litterateur_, that Ivanhoe
+appeared to me to be very unequal, the first half being incomparably the
+best, but that, as a whole, I thought it stood quite at the head of the
+particular sort of romances to which it belonged. The Antiquary, and Guy
+Mannering, for instance, were both much nearer perfection, and, on the
+whole, I thought both better books; but Ivanhoe, especially its
+commencement, was a noble poem. But did I not condemn the want of
+historical truth in its pictures? I did not consider Ivanhoe as intended
+to be history; it was a work of the imagination, in which all the
+fidelity that was requisite, was enough to be probable and natural, and
+that requisite I thought it possessed in an eminent degree. It is true,
+antiquarians accused the author of having committed some anachronisms,
+by confounding the usages of different centuries, which was perhaps a
+greater fault, in such a work, than to confound mere individual
+characters; but of this I did not pretend to judge, not being the least
+of an antiquary myself. Did I not think he had done gross injustice to
+the noble and useful order of the Templars? On this point I could say no
+more than on the preceding, having but a very superficial knowledge of
+the Templars, though I thought the probabilities seemed to be perfectly
+well respected. Nothing could _seem_ to be more true, than Scott's
+pictures. My guest then went into a long vindication of the Templars,
+stating Scott had done them gross injustice, and concluding with an
+exaggerated compliment, in which it was attempted to persuade me that I
+was the man to vindicate the truth, and to do justice to at subject that
+was so peculiarly connected with liberal principles. I disclaimed the
+ability to undertake such a task, at all; confessed that I did not wish
+to disturb the images which Sir Walter Scott had left, had I the
+ability; and declared I did not see the connexion between his
+accusation, admitting it to be true, and liberal principles.
+
+My visitor soon after went away, and I saw no more of him for a week,
+when he came again. On this occasion, he commenced by relating several
+_piquant_ anecdotes of the Bourbons and their friends, gradually and
+ingeniously leading the conversation, again, round to his favourite
+Templars. After pushing me, for half an hour, on this point, always
+insisting on my being the man to vindicate the order, and harping on its
+connexion with liberty, he took advantage of one of my often-repeated
+protestations of ignorance of the whole matter, suddenly to say, "Well,
+then, Monsieur, go and see for yourself, and you will soon be satisfied
+that my account of the order is true." "Go and see what?" "The
+Templars." "There are no longer any." "They exist still." "Where?"
+"Here, in Paris." "This is new to me: I do not understand it." "The
+Templars exist; they possess documents to prove how much Scott has
+misrepresented them, and--but, you will remember that the actual
+government has so much jealousy of everything it does not control, that
+secrecy is necessary--and, to be frank with you, M. ----, I am
+commissioned by the Grand Master, to invite you to be present at a
+secret meeting, this very week."
+
+Of course, I immediately conjectured that some of the political
+agitators of the day had assumed this taking guise, in order to combine
+their means, and carry out their plans.[31] The proposition was gotten
+rid of, by my stating, in terms that could not be misunderstood, that I
+was a traveller, and did not wish to meddle with anything that required
+secrecy, in a foreign government; that I certainly had my own political
+notions, and if pushed, should not hesitate to avow them anywhere; that
+the proper place for a writer to declare his sentiments, was in his
+books, unless under circumstances which authorized him to act; that I
+did not conceive foreigners were justifiable in going beyond this; that
+I never had meddled with the affairs of foreign countries, and that I
+never would; and that the fact of this society's being secret, was
+sufficient to deter me from visiting it. With this answer, my guest
+departed, and he never came again.
+
+[Footnote 31: Since the revolution of 1830, these Templars have made
+public, but abortive efforts, to bring themselves into notice, by
+instituting some ceremonies, in which they appeared openly in their
+robes.]
+
+Now, the first impression was, as I have told you, and I supposed my
+visitor, although a man of fifty, was one of those who innocently lent
+himself to these silly exaggerations; either as a dupe, or to dupe
+others. I saw reason, however, to change this opinion.
+
+At the time these visits occurred, I scarcely knew any one in Paris, and
+was living in absolute retirement--being, as you know already, quite
+without letters. About ten days after I saw the last of my
+_litterateur_, I got a letter from a high functionary of the government,
+sending me a set of valuable medals. The following day these were
+succeeded by his card, and an invitation to dinner. Soon after, another
+person, notoriously connected with court intrigues, sought me out, and
+overwhelmed me with civilities. In a conversation that shortly after
+occurred between us, this person gave a pretty direct intimation, that
+by pushing a little, a certain decoration that is usually conferred on
+literary men was to be had, if it were desired. I got rid of all these
+things, in the straight-forward manner, that is the best for upsetting
+intrigues; and having really nothing to conceal, I was shortly permitted
+to take my own course.
+
+I have now little doubt that the _litterateur_ was a _spy_, sent either
+to sound me on some points connected with Lafayette and the republicans,
+or possibly to lead me into some difficulty, though I admit that this is
+no more than conjecture. I give you the facts, which, at the time,
+struck me as, at least, odd, and you may draw your own conclusions.
+This, however, is but one of a dozen adventures, more or less similar,
+that have occurred, and I think it well to mention it, by way of giving
+you an insight into what sometimes happens here.[32]
+
+[Footnote 32: A conversation, which took place after the revolution of
+1830, with one of the parties named, leaves little doubt as to the truth
+of the original conjecture.]
+
+My rule has been, whenever I am pushed on the subject of politics, to
+deal honestly and sincerely with all with whom I am brought in contact,
+and in no manner to leave the impression, that I think the popular form
+of government an unavoidable evil, to which America is obliged to
+submit. I do not shut my eyes to the defects of our own system, or to
+the bad consequences that flow from it, and from it alone; but, the more
+I see of other countries, the more I am persuaded, that, under
+circumstances which admit but of a choice of evils, we are greatly the
+gainers by having adopted it. Although I do not believe every other
+nation is precisely fitted to imitate us, I think it is their misfortune
+they are not so. If the inhabitants of other countries do not like to
+hear such opinions, they should avoid the subject with Americans.
+
+It is very much the custom here, whenever the example of America is
+quoted in favour of the practicability of republican institutions, to
+attribute our success to the fact of society's being so simple, and the
+people so virtuous. I presume I speak within bounds, when I say that I
+have heard the latter argument urged a hundred times, during the last
+eighteen months. One lady, in particular, who is exceedingly clever, but
+who has a dread of all republics, on account of having lost a near
+friend during the reign of terror, was especially in the practice of
+resorting to this argument, whenever, in our frequent playful
+discussions of the subject, I have succeeded in disturbing her
+inferences, by citing American facts. "Mais, Monsieur, l'Amerique est si
+jeune, et vous avez les vertus que nous manquons," etc. etc. has always
+been thought a sufficient answer. Now I happen to be one of those who do
+not entertain such extravagant notions of the exclusive and peculiar
+virtues of our own country. Nor have I been so much struck with the
+profound respect of the Europeans, in general, for those very qualities
+that, nevertheless, are always quoted as the reason of the success of
+what is called the "American experiment." Quite the contrary: I have
+found myself called on, more than once, to repel accusations against our
+morality of a very serious nature; accusations that we do not deserve;
+and my impression certainly is, that the American people, so far as they
+are at all the subjects of observation, enjoy anything but a good name,
+in Europe. Struck by this flagrant contradiction, I determined to
+practise on my female friend, a little; a plan that was successfully
+carried out, as follows.
+
+Avoiding all allusion to politics, so as to throw her completely off her
+guard, I took care to introduce such subjects as should provoke
+comparisons on other points, between France and America; or rather,
+between the latter and Europe generally. As our discussions had a tinge
+of philosophy, neither being very bigoted, and both preserving perfect
+good humour, the plot succeeded admirably. After a little time, I took
+occasion to fortify one of my arguments by a slight allusion to the
+peculiar virtues of the American people. She was too well-bred to
+controvert this sort of reasoning at first, until, pushing the point,
+little by little, she was so far provoked as to exclaim, "You lay great
+stress on the exclusive virtues of your countrymen, Monsieur, but I have
+yet to learn that they are so much better than the rest of the world!"
+"I beg a thousand pardons, Madame, if I have been led into an
+indiscretion on this delicate subject; but you must ascribe my error to
+your own eloquence, which, contrary to my previous convictions, had
+persuaded me into the belief that we have some peculiar unction of this
+nature, that is unknown in Europe. I now begin to see the mistake, and
+to understand "que nous autres Americains" are to be considered
+_virtuous_ only where there is question of the practicability of
+maintaining republican form of government, and as great rogues on all
+other occasions." Madame de ---- was wise enough, and good-tempered
+enough, to laugh at the artifice, and the allusion to "nous autres
+vertueux" has got to be a _mot d'ordre_ with us. The truth is, that the
+question of politics is exclusively one of personal advantages, with a
+vast majority of the people of Europe; one set selfishly struggling to
+maintain their present superiority, while the other is as selfishly, and
+in some respects as blindly, striving to overturn all that is
+established, in order to be benefited by the scramble that will follow;
+and religion, justice, philosophy, and practical good are almost equally
+remote from the motives of both parties.
+
+From reflecting on such subjects, I have been led into a consideration
+of the influence of political institutions on the more ordinary
+relations of society. If the conclusions are generally in favour of
+popular rights, and what is called freedom, there can be little question
+that there are one or two weak spots, on our side of the question, that
+it were better did they not exist. Let us, for the humour of the thing,
+look a little into these points.
+
+It is a common remark of all foreigners, that there is less social
+freedom in America than in most other countries of Christendom. By
+social freedom, I do not mean as relates to the mere forms of society,
+for in these we are loose rather than rigid; but that one is less a
+master of his own acts, his own mode of living, his own time, being more
+rigidly amenable to public opinion, on all these points, than elsewhere.
+The fact, I believe, out of all question, is true; at least it appears
+to be true, so far as my knowledge of our own and of other countries
+extends. Admitting then the fact to be so, it is worth while to throw
+away a moment in inquiring into the consequent good and evil of such a
+state of things, as well as in looking for the causes. It is always a
+great assistant in our study of others, to have some tolerable notions
+of ourselves.
+
+The control of public opinion has, beyond question, a salutary influence
+on the moral _exterior_ of a country. The great indifference which the
+French, and indeed the higher classes of most European countries,
+manifest to the manner of living of the members of their different
+circles, so long as certain appearances are respected, may do no
+affirmative good to society, though at the same time it does less
+positive harm than you may be disposed to imagine. But this is not the
+point to which I now allude. Europeans maintain that, in things
+_innocent in themselves_, but which are closely connected with the
+independence of action and tastes of men, the American is less his own
+master than the inhabitant of this part of the world; and this is the
+fact I, for one, feel it necessary to concede to them. There can be no
+doubt that society meddles much more with the private affairs of
+individuals, and affairs, too, over which it properly has no control, in
+America than in Europe. I will illustrate what I mean, by an example.
+
+About twenty years since there lived in one of our shiretowns a family,
+which, in its different branches, had numerous female descendants, then
+all children. A member of this family, one day, went to a respectable
+clergyman, his friend, and told him that he and his connexions had so
+many female children, whom it was time to think of educating, that they
+had hit upon the plan of engaging some suitable instructress, with the
+intention of educating their girls all together, both for economy's sake
+and for convenience, as well as that such near connexions might be
+brought up in a way to strengthen the family tie. The clergyman warmly
+remonstrated against the scheme, assuring his friend, _that the
+community would not bear it, and that it would infallibly make enemies!_
+This was the feeling of a very sensible man, and of an experienced
+divine, and I was myself the person making the application. This is
+religiously true, and I have often thought of the circumstance since,
+equally with astonishment and horror.
+
+There are doubtless many parts of America, even, where such an
+interference with the private arrangement of a family would not be
+dreamt of; but there is a large portion of the country in which the
+feeling described by my clerical friend does prevail. Most observers
+would refer all this to democracy, but I do not. The interference would
+not proceed from the humblest classes of society at all, but from those
+nearer one's own level. It would proceed from a determination to bring
+all within the jurisdiction of a common opinion, or to be revenged on
+delinquents, by envy, hatred, and all uncharitableness. There is no
+disposition in America, to let one live as he or she may happen to
+please to live; the public choosing, though always in its proper circle,
+to interfere and say _how_ you must live. It is folly to call this by
+terms as sounding as republicanism or democracy, which inculcate the
+doctrine of as much personal freedom as at all comports with the public
+good. He is, indeed, a most sneaking democrat, who finds it necessary to
+consult a neighbourhood before he can indulge his innocent habits and
+tastes. It is sheer _meddling_, and no casuistry can fitly give it any
+other name.
+
+A portion of this troublesome quality is owing, beyond question, to our
+provincial habits, which are always the most exacting; but I think a
+large portion, perhaps I ought to say the largest, is inherited from
+those pious but exaggerated religionists who first peopled the country.
+These sectaries extended the discipline of the church to all the
+concerns of life. Nothing was too minute to escape their cognizance, and
+a parish sat in judgment on the affairs of all who belonged to it. One
+may easily live so long in the condition of society that such an origin
+has entailed on us, as to be quite unconscious of its peculiarities, but
+I think they can hardly escape one who has lived much beyond its
+influence.
+
+Here, perhaps, the fault is to be found in the opposite extreme; though
+there are so many virtues consequent on independence of thought and
+independence of habits, that I am not sure the good does not equal the
+evil. There is no canting, and very little hypocrisy, in mere matters of
+habits, in France; and this, at once, is abridging two of our own most
+besetting vices. Still the French can hardly be called a very original
+people. Convention ties them down mercilessly in a great many things.
+They are less under the influence of mere fashion, in their intercourse,
+it is true, than some of their neighbours, reason and taste exercising
+more influence over such matters, in France, than almost anywhere else;
+but they are mannerists in the fine arts, in their literature, and in
+all their _feelings_, if one can use such an expression. The gross
+exaggerations of the romantic school that is, just now, attracting so
+much attention, are merely an effort to liberate themselves. But, after
+allowing for the extreme ignorance of the substratum of society, which,
+in France, although it forms so large a portion of the whole, should no
+more be taken into the account in speaking of the national qualities,
+than the slaves of Carolina should be included in an estimate of the
+character of the Carolinians, there is, notwithstanding this mannerism,
+a personal independence here, that certainly does not exist with us. The
+American goes and comes when he pleases, and no one asks for a passport;
+he has his political rights, talks of his liberty, swaggers of his
+advantages, and yet does less as he pleases, even in innocent things,
+than the Frenchman. His neighbours form a police, and a most troublesome
+and impertinent one it sometimes proves to be. It is also unjust, for
+having no legal means of arriving at facts, it half the time condemns on
+conjecture.
+
+The truth is, our institutions are the result of facts and accidents,
+and, being necessarily an imitative people, there are often gross
+inconsistencies between our professions and our practice; whereas the
+French have had to struggle through their apprenticeship in political
+rights, by the force of discussions and appeals to reason, and theory is
+still too important to be entirely overlooked. Perhaps no people
+understand the _true_ private characters of their public men so little
+as the Americans, or any people so well as the French. I have never
+known a distinguished American, in whom it did not appear to me that his
+popular character was a false one; or a distinguished Frenchman, whom
+the public did not appear to estimate very nearly as he deserved to be.
+Even Napoleon, necessary as he is to the national pride, and dazzling as
+is all military renown, seems to me to be much more justly appreciated
+at Paris than anywhere else. The practice of meddling can lead to no
+other result. They who wish to stand particularly fair before the
+public, resort to deception, and I have heard a man of considerable
+notoriety in America confess, that he was so much afraid of popular
+comments, that he always acted as if an enemy were looking over his
+shoulder. With us, no one scruples to believe that he knows all about a
+public man, even to the nicest traits of his character; all talk of him,
+as none should talk but those who are in his intimacy, and, what between
+hypocrisy on his part--an hypocrisy to which he is in some measure
+driven by the officious interference with his most private
+interests--and exaggerations and inventions, that ingenious tyrant,
+public opinion, comes as near the truth as a fortune-teller who is
+venturing his prediction in behalf of a stranger.[33]
+
+[Footnote 33: I can give no better illustration of the state of
+dependence to which men are reduced in America, by this spirit of
+meddling, than by the following anecdote: A friend was about to build a
+new town-house, and letting me know the situation, he asked my advice as
+to the mode of construction. The inconveniences of an ordinary American
+town-house were pointed out to him,--its unfitness for the general state
+of society, the climate, the other domestic arrangements, and its
+ugliness. All were admitted, and the plan proposed in place of the old
+style of building was liked, but still my friend hesitated about
+adopting it. "It will be a genteeler and a better-looking house than the
+other." "Agreed." "It will be really more convenient." "I think so,
+too." "It will be cheaper." "Of that there is no question." "Then why
+not adopt it?" "To own the truth, I _dare not build differently from my
+neighbour!_"]
+
+In France the right of the citizen to discuss all public matters is not
+only allowed, but _felt_. In America it is not _felt_, though it is
+allowed. A homage must be paid to the public, by assuming the disguise
+of acting as a public agent, in America; whereas, in France, individuals
+address their countrymen, daily, under their own signatures. The
+impersonality of _we_, and the character of public journalists, is
+almost indispensable, with us, to impunity, although the mask can
+deceive no one, the journalists notoriously making their prints
+subservient to their private passions and private interests, and being
+_impersonal_ only in the use of the imperial pronoun. The
+_representative_, too, in America, is privileged to teach, in virtue of
+his collective character, by the very men who hold the extreme and
+untenable doctrine of instruction! It is the fashion to say in America,
+_that the people will rule!_ it would be nearer the truth, however, to
+say, _the people will seem to rule_.
+
+I think that these distinctions are facts, and they certainly lead to
+odd reflections. We are so peculiarly situated as a nation, that one is
+not to venture on conclusions too hastily. A great deal is to be imputed
+to our provincial habits; much to the circumstance of the disproportion
+between surface and population, which, by scattering the well-bred and
+intelligent, a class at all times relatively small, serves greatly to
+lessen their influence in imparting tone to society; something to the
+inquisitorial habits of our pious forefathers, who appear to have
+thought that the charities were nought, and, in the very teeth of
+revelation, that Heaven was to be stormed by impertinences; while a good
+deal is to be conceded to the nature of a popular government whose
+essential spirit is to create a predominant opinion, before which, right
+or wrong, all must bow until its cycle shall be completed. Thus it is,
+that we are always, more or less, under one of two false influences, the
+blow or its rebound; action that is seldom quite right, or reaction that
+is always wrong; sinning heedlessly, or repeating to fanaticism. The
+surest process in the world, of "riding on to fortune" in America, is to
+get seated astride a lively "reaction," which is rather more likely to
+carry with it a unanimous sentiment, than even the error to which it
+owes its birth.
+
+As much of this weakness as is inseparable from humanity exists here,
+but it exists under so many modifying circumstances, as, in this
+particular, to render France as unlike America as well may be. Liberty
+is not always pure philosophy nor strict justice, and yet, as a whole,
+it is favourable to both. These are the spots on the political sun. To
+the eye which seeks only the radiance and warmth of the orb, they are
+lost; but he who studies it, with calmness and impartiality, sees them
+too plainly to be in any doubt of their existence.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XXII.
+
+Animal Magnetism.--Somnambules.--Magnetised Patients.--My own
+Examination.--A Prediction.--Ventriloquism.--Force of the Imagination.
+
+
+To JAMES E. DE KAY, M.D.
+
+Although we have not been without our metaphysical hallucinations in
+America, I do not remember to have heard that "animal magnetism" was
+ever in vogue among us. A people who are not very quick to feel the
+poetry of sentiment, may well be supposed exempt from the delusions of a
+doctrine which comprehends the very poetry of physics. Still, as the
+subject is not without interest, and as chance has put me in the way of
+personally inquiring into this fanciful system, I intend, in this
+letter, to give you an account of what I have both heard and seen.
+
+I shall premise by saying that I rank "animal magnetism" among the
+"arts" rather than among the "sciences." Of its theory I have no very
+clear notion, nor do I believe that I am at all peculiar in my
+ignorance; but until we can say what is that other "magnetism" to which
+the world is indisputably so much indebted for its knowledge and
+comforts, I do not know that we are to repudiate this, merely because we
+do not understand it. Magnetism is an unseen and inexplicable influence,
+and that is "metallic," while this is "animal;" _voila tout_. On the
+whole, it may be fairly mooted which most controls the world, the animal
+or the metallic influence.
+
+To deal gravely with a subject that, at least, baffles our
+comprehension, there are certainly very extraordinary things related of
+animal magnetism, and apparently on pretty good testimony. Take, for
+instance, a single fact. M. Jules Cloquet is one of the cleverest
+practitioners of Paris, and is in extensive business. This gentleman
+publicly makes the following statement. I write it from memory, but have
+heard it and read it so often, that I do not think my account will
+contain any essential error.
+
+A woman, who was subject to the magnetic influence, or who was what is
+commonly called a _somnambule_, had a cancer in the breast. M. ----, one
+of the principal magnetisers of Paris, and from whom, among others, I
+have had an account of the whole affair, was engaged to magnetise this
+woman, while M. Cloquet operated on the diseased part. The patient was
+put asleep, or rather into the magnetic trance, for it can scarcely be
+called sleep, and the cancer was extracted, without the woman's
+_manifesting the least terror, or the slightest sense of pain!_ To the
+truth of the substance of this account, M. Cloquet, who does not pretend
+to explain the reason, nor profess to belong, in any way, to the school,
+simply testifies. He says that he had such a patient, and that she was
+operated on, virtually, as I have told you. Such a statement, coming
+from so high a source, induced the Academy, which is certainly not
+altogether composed of magnetisers, but many of whose members are quite
+animal enough to comprehend the matter, to refer the subject to a
+special committee, which committee, I believe, was comprised of very
+clever men. The substance of their report was pretty much what might
+have been anticipated. They said that the subject was inexplicable, and
+that "animal magnetism" could not be brought within the limits of any
+known laws of nature. They might have said the same thing of the comets!
+In both cases we have facts, with a few established consequences, but
+are totally without elementary causes.
+
+Animal magnetism is clearly one of three things: it is what it pretends
+to be, an unexplained and as yet incomprehensible physical influence; it
+is delusion, or it is absolute fraud.
+
+A young countryman of ours, having made the acquaintance of M. C----,
+professionally, and being full of the subject, I have so far listened to
+his entreaties as to inquire personally into the facts, a step I might
+not have otherwise been induced to take.
+
+I shall now proceed to the history of my own experience in this
+inexplicable mystery. We found M. C---- buried in the heart of Paris, in
+one of those vast old hotels, which give to this town the air of
+generations of houses, commencing with the quaint and noble of the
+sixteenth century, and ending with the more fashionable pavilion of our
+own times. His cabinet looked upon a small garden, a pleasant transition
+from the animal within to the vegetable without. But one meets with
+gardens, with their verdure and shrubbery and trees, in the most
+unexpected manner, in this crowded town.
+
+M. C---- received us politely, and we found with him one of his
+_somnambules_; but as she had just come out of a trance, we were told
+she could not be put asleep again that morning. Our first visit,
+therefore, went no farther than some discourse on the subject of "animal
+magnetism," and a little practical by-play, that shall be related in its
+place.
+
+M. C---- did not attempt ascending to first principles, in his
+explanations. Animal magnetism was animal magnetism--it was a fact, and
+not a theory. Its effects were not to be doubted; they depended on
+testimony of sufficient validity to dispose of any mere question of
+authenticity. All that he attempted was hypothesis, which he invited us
+to controvert. He might as well have desired me to demonstrate that the
+sun is not a carbuncle. On the _modus operandi_, and the powers of his
+art, the doctor was more explicit. There were a great many gradations in
+quality in his _somnambules_, some being better and some worse; and
+there was also a good deal of difference in the _intensity_ of the
+_magnetiser's_. It appears to be settled that the best _somnambules_ are
+females, and the best _magnetisers_ males, though the law is not
+absolute. I was flattered with being, by nature, a first-rate
+magnetiser, and the doctor had not the smallest doubt of his ability to
+put me to sleep; and ability, so far as his theory went, I thought it
+was likely enough he might possess, though I greatly questioned his
+physical means.
+
+I suppose it is _prima facie_ evidence of credulity, to take the trouble
+to inquire into the subject at all; at any rate it was quite evident I
+was set down as a good subject, from the moment of my appearance. Even
+the _somnambule_ testified to this, though she would not then consent to
+be put into a trance in order to give her opinion its mystical sanction.
+
+The powers of a really good _somnambule_ are certainly of a very
+respectable class. If a lock of hair be cut from the head of an invalid,
+and sent a hundred leagues from the provinces, such a _somnambule_,
+properly magnetised, becomes gifted with the faculty to discover the
+seat of the disease, however latent; and, by practice, she may even
+prescribe the remedy, though this is usually done by a physician, like
+M. C----, who is regularly graduated. The _somnambule_ is, properly,
+only versed in pathology, any other skill she may discover being either
+a consequence of this knowledge, or the effects of observation and
+experience. The powers of a _somnambule_ extend equally to the _morale_
+as well as to the _physique_. In this respect a phrenologist is a pure
+quack in comparison with a lady in a trance. The latter has no
+dependence on bumps and organs, but she looks right through you, at a
+glance, and pronounces _ex cathedra_, whether you are a rogue, or an
+honest man; a well-disposed, or an evil-disposed child of Adam. In this
+particular, it is an invaluable science, and it is a thousand pities all
+young women were not magnetised before they pronounce the fatal vows, as
+not a few of them would probably wake up, and cheat the parson of his
+fee. Our sex is difficult to be put asleep, and are so obstinate, that I
+doubt if they would be satisfied with a shadowy glimpse of the temper
+and dispositions of their mistresses.
+
+You may possibly think I am trifling with you, and that I invent as I
+write. On the contrary, I have not related one half of the miraculous
+powers which being magnetised imparts to the thoroughly good
+_somnambule_, as they were related to me by M. C----, and vouched for by
+four or five of his patients who were present, as well as by my own
+companion, a firm believer in the doctrine. M. C---- added that
+_somnambules_ improve by practice, as well as _magnetisers_, and that he
+has such command over one of his _somnambules_ that he can put her to
+sleep, by a simple effort of the will, although she may be in her own
+apartment, in an adjoining street. He related the story of M. Cloquet
+and the cancer, with great unction, and asked me what I thought of that?
+Upon my word, I did not very well know what I did think of it, unless it
+was to think it very queer. It appeared to me to be altogether
+extraordinary, especially as I knew M. Cloquet to be a man of talents,
+and believe him to be honest.
+
+By this time I was nearly magnetised with second-hand facts; and I
+became a little urgent for one or two that were visible to my own sense.
+I was promised more testimony, and a sight of the process of magnetising
+some water that a patient was to drink. This patient was present; the
+very type of credulity. He listened to everything that fell from M.
+C---- with a _gusto_ and a faith that might have worked miracles truly,
+had it been of the right sort, now and then turning his good-humoured
+marvel-eating eyes on me, as much as to say, "What do you think of that,
+now?" My companion told me, in English, he was a man of good estate, and
+of proved philanthropy, who had no more doubt of the efficacy of animal
+magnetism than I had of my being in the room. He had brought with him
+two bottles of water, and these M. C---- _magnetised_, by pointing his
+fingers at their orifices, rubbing their sides, and ringing his hands
+about them as if washing them, in order to disengage the subtle fluid
+that was to impart to them their healing properties, for the patient
+drank no other water.
+
+Presently a young man came in, of a good countenance and certainly of a
+very respectable exterior. As the _somnambule_ had left us, and this
+person could not consult her, which was his avowed intention in coming,
+M. C---- proposed to let me see his own power as a magnetiser, in an
+experiment on this patient. The young man consenting, the parties were
+soon prepared. M. C---- began by telling me, that he would, by _a
+transfusion of his will_, into the body of the patient, compel him to
+sit still, although his own desire should be to rise. In order to
+achieve this, he placed himself before the young man and threw off the
+fluid from his fingers' ends, which he kept in a cluster, by constant
+forward gestures of the arms. Sometimes he held the fingers pointed at
+some particular part of the body, the heart in preference, though the
+brain would have been more poetical. The young man certainly did not
+rise; neither did I, nor any one else in the room. As this experiment
+appeared so satisfactory to everybody else, I was almost ashamed to
+distrust it, easy as it really seemed to sit still, with a man
+flourishing his fingers before one's eyes.
+
+I proposed that the doctor should see if he could pin me down, in this
+invisible fashion, but this he frankly admitted he did not think he
+could do _so soon_, though he foresaw I would become a firm believer in
+the existence of animal magnetism, ere long, and a public supporter of
+its wonders. In time, he did not doubt his power to work the same
+miracle on me. He then varied the experiment, by making the young man
+raise his arm _contrary_ to his wishes. The same process was repealed,
+all the fluid being directed at the arm, which, after a severe trial,
+was slowly raised, until it pointed forward like a finger-board. After
+this he was made to stand up, in spite of himself. This was the hardest
+affair of all, the doctor throwing off the fluid in handfuls; the
+magnetised refusing for some time to budge an inch. At length he
+suddenly stood up, and seemed to draw his breath like one who finally
+yields after a strong trial of his physical force.
+
+Nothing, certainly, is easier than for a young man to sit still and to
+stand up, pretending that he strives internally to resist the desire to
+do either. Still, if you ask me, if I think this was simple collusion, I
+hardly know what to answer. It is the easiest solution, and yet it did
+not strike me as being the true one. I never saw less of the appearance
+of deception than in the air of this young man; his face, deportment,
+and acts being those of a person in sober earnest. He made no
+professions, was extremely modest, and really seemed anxious not to have
+the experiments tried. To my question, if he resisted the will of M.
+C----, he answered, as much as he could, and said, that when he rose, he
+did it because he could not help himself. I confess myself disposed to
+believe in his sincerity and good faith.
+
+I had somewhat of a reputation, when a boy, of effecting my objects by
+pure dint of teasing. Many is the shilling I have abstracted, in this
+way, from my mother's purse, who, constantly affirmed that it was sore
+against her will. Now, it seems to me, that M. C---- may, very easily,
+have acquired so much command over a credulous youth, as to cause him to
+do things of this nature, as he may fancy, against his own will. Signs
+are the substitutes of words, which of themselves are purely
+conventional, and, in his case, the flourishing of the fingers are
+merely so many continued solicitations to get up. When the confirmation
+of a theory that is already received, and which is doubly attractive by
+its mysticisms, depends, in some measure, on the result, the experiment
+becomes still less likely to fail. It is stripping one of all
+pretensions to be a physiognomist, to believe that this young man was
+not honest; and I prefer getting over the difficulty in this way. As to
+the operator himself, he might, or might not, be the dupe of his own
+powers. If the former, I think it would, on the whole, render him the
+more likely to succeed with his subject.
+
+After a visit or two, I was considered sufficiently advanced to be
+scientifically examined. One of the very best of the _somnambules_ was
+employed on the occasion, and everything being in readiness, she was put
+to sleep. There was a faith-shaking brevity in this process, which, to
+say the least, if not fraudulent, was ill-judged. The doctor merely
+pointed his fingers at her once or twice, looking her intently in the
+eye, and the woman gaped; this success was followed up by a flourish or
+two of the hand, and the woman slept, or was magnetised. Now this was
+hardly sufficient even for my theory of the influence of the
+imagination. One could have wished the _somnambule_ had not been so
+drowsy. But there she was, with her eyes shut, giving an occasional
+hearty gape, and the doctor declared her perfectly lit for service. She
+retained her seat, however, moved her body, laughed, talked, and, in all
+other respects, seemed to be precisely the woman she was before he
+pointed his fingers at her. At first, I felt a disposition to manifest
+that more parade was indispensable to humbugging me (who am not the
+Pope, you will remember), but reflection said, the wisest way was to
+affect a little faith, as the surest means of securing more experiments.
+Moreover, I am not certain, on the whole, that the simplicity of the
+operation is not in favour of the sincerity of the parties; for, were
+deception deliberately planned, it would be apt to call in the aid of
+more mummery, and this, particularly, in a case in which there was
+probably a stronger desire than usual to make a convert.
+
+I gave the _somnambule_ my hand, and the examination was commenced,
+forthwith. I was first physically inspected, and the report was highly
+favourable to the condition of the animal. I had the satisfaction of
+hearing from this high authority, that the whole machinery of the mere
+material man was in perfect order, everything working well and in its
+proper place. This was a little contrary to my own experience, it is
+true, but as I had no means of seeing the interior clock-work of my own
+frame, like the _somnambule_, had I ventured to raise a doubt, it would
+have been overturned by the evidence of one who had ocular proofs of
+what she said, and should, beyond question, have incurred the ridicule
+of being accounted a _malade imaginaire_.
+
+Modesty must prevent my recording all that this obliging _somnambule_
+testified to, on the subject of my _morale_. Her account of the matter
+was highly satisfactory, and I must have been made of stone, not to
+credit her and her mysticisms. M. C---- looked at me again and again,
+with an air of triumph, as much as to say, "What do you think of all
+that now?--are you not _really_ the noble, honest, virtuous,
+disinterested, brave creature, she has described you to be?" I can
+assure you, it required no little self-denial to abstain from becoming a
+convert to the whole system. As it is very unusual to find a man with a
+good head, who has not a secret inclination to believe in phrenology, so
+does he, who is thus purified by the scrutiny of animal magnetism, feel
+disposed to credit its mysterious influence. Certainly, I might have
+gaped, in my turn, and commenced the moral and physical dissection of
+the _somnambule_, whose hand I held, and no one could have given me the
+lie, for nothing is easier than to speak _ex cathedra_, when one has a
+monopoly of knowledge.
+
+Encouraged by this flattering account of my own condition, I begged hard
+for some more indisputable evidence of the truth of the theory. I
+carried a stop-watch, and as I had taken an opportunity to push the stop
+on entering the room, I was particularly desirous that the _somnambule_
+should tell me the time indicated by its hands, a common test of their
+powers, I had been told; but to this M. C---- objected, referring
+everything of this tangible nature to future occasions. In fine, I could
+get nothing during three or four visits, but pretty positive assertions,
+expressions of wonder that I should affect to doubt what had been so
+often and so triumphantly proved to others, accounts physical and moral,
+like the one of which I had been the subject myself, and which did not
+admit of either confirmation or refutation, and often-repeated
+declarations, that the time was not distant when, in my own unworthy
+person, I was to become one of the most powerful magnetisers of the age.
+All this did very well to amuse, but very little towards convincing; and
+I was finally promised, that at my next visit, the _somnambule_ would be
+prepared to show her powers, in a way that would not admit of cavil.
+
+I went to the appointed meeting with a good deal of curiosity to learn
+the issue, and a resolution not to be easily duped. When I presented
+myself (I believe it was the fourth visit), M. C---- gave me a sealed
+paper, that was not to be opened for several weeks, and which, he said,
+contained the prediction of an event that was to occur to myself,
+between the present time and the day set for the opening of the letter,
+and which the _somnambule_ had been enabled to foresee, in consequence
+of the interest she took in me and mine. With this sealed revelation,
+then, I was obliged to depart, to await the allotted hour.
+
+M. C---- had promised to be present at the opening of the seal, but he
+did not appear. I dealt fairly by him, and the cover was first formally
+removed, on the evening of the day endorsed on its back, as the one when
+it would be permitted. The _somnambule_ had foretold that, in the
+intervening time, one of my children would be seriously ill, that I
+should magnetise it, and the child would recover. Nothing of the sort
+had occurred. No one of the family had been ill, I had not attempted to
+magnetise any one, or even dreamed of it, and, of course, the whole
+prediction was a complete failure.
+
+To do M. C---- justice, when he heard the result, he manifested surprise
+rather than any less confident feeling. I was closely questioned, first,
+as to whether either of the family had not been ill, and secondly,
+whether I had not felt a secret desire to magnetise any one of them. To
+all these interrogatories, truth compelled me to give unqualified
+negatives. I had hardly thought of the subject during the whole time. As
+this interview took place at my own house, politeness compelled me to
+pass the matter off as lightly as possible. There happened to be several
+ladies present, however, the evening M. C---- called, and, thinking the
+occasion a good one for him to try his powers on some one besides his
+regular _somnambules_, I invited him to magnetise any one of the party
+who might be disposed to submit to the process. To this he made no
+difficulty, choosing an English female friend as the subject of the
+experiment. The lady in question raised no objection, and the doctor
+commenced with great zeal, and with every appearance of faith in his own
+powers. No effect, however, was produced on this lady, or on one or two
+more of the party, all of whom obstinately refused even to gape. M.
+C---- gave the matter up, and soon after took his leave, and thus closed
+my personal connexion with animal magnetism.
+
+If you ask me for the conclusions I have drawn from these facts, I shall
+be obliged to tell you, that I am in doubt how far the parties concerned
+deceived others, and how far they deceived themselves. It is difficult
+to discredit entirely all the testimony that has been adduced in behalf
+of this power; and one is consequently obliged to refer all the
+established facts to the influence of the imagination. Then testimony
+itself is but a precarious thing, different eyes seeing the same objects
+in different lights.
+
+Let us take ventriloquism as a parallel case to that of animal
+magnetism. Ventriloquism is neither more nor less than imitation; and
+yet, aided by the imagination, perhaps a majority of those who know
+anything about it, are inclined to believe there is really such a
+faculty as that which is vulgarly attributed to ventriloquism. The whole
+art of the ventriloquist consists in making such sounds as would be
+produced by a person, or thing, that should be actually in the
+circumstances that he wishes to represent. Let there be, for instance,
+five or six sitting around a table, in a room with a single door; a
+ventriloquist among them wishes to mislead his companions, by making
+them believe that another is applying for admission. All he has to do,
+is to make a sound similar to that which a person on the outside would
+make, in applying for admission. "Open the door, and let me in," uttered
+in such a manner, would deceive any one who was not prepared for the
+experiment, simply because men do not ordinarily make such sounds when
+sitting near each other, because the words themselves would draw the
+attention to the door, and because the sounds would be suited to the
+fictitious application. If there were _two_ doors, the person first
+moving his head towards one of them, would probably give a direction to
+the imaginations of all the others; unless, indeed, the ventriloquist
+himself, by his words, or his own movements, as is usually the case,
+should assume the initiative. Every ventriloquist takes especial care to
+_direct_ the imagination of his listener to the desired point, either by
+what he says, by some gesture, or by some movement. Such, undeniably, is
+the fact in regard to ventriloquism; for we know enough of the
+philosophy of sound, to be certain it can he nothing else. One of the
+best ventriloquists of this age, after affecting to resist this
+explanation of his mystery, candidly admitted to me, on finding that I
+stuck to the principles of reason, that all his art consisted of no more
+than a power to control the imagination by imitation supported
+occasionally by acting. And yet I once saw this man literally turn a
+whole family out of doors, in a storm, by an exercise of his art. On
+that occasion, so complete was the delusion, that the good people of the
+house actually fancied sounds which came from the ventriloquist, came
+from a point considerably beyond the place where they stood, and on the
+side _opposite_ to that occupied by the speaker, although they stood at
+the top of a flight of steps, and he stood at the bottom. All this time,
+the sounds appeared to me to come from the place whence, by the laws of
+sound, except in cases of reverberation, and of the influence of the
+imagination, they only could appear to come; or, in other words, from
+the mouth of the ventriloquist himself. Now, if the imagination can
+effect so much, even in crowded assemblies, composed of people of all
+degrees of credulity, intelligence, and strength of mind, and when all
+are prepared, in part at least, for the delusion, what may it not be
+expected to produce on minds peculiarly suited to yield to its
+influence, and this, too, when the prodigy takes the captivating form of
+mysticism and miracles!
+
+In the case of the patient of M. Cloquet, we are reduced to the
+alternatives of denying the testimony, of believing that recourse was
+had to drugs, of referring all to the force of the imagination, or of
+admitting the truth of the doctrine of animal magnetism. The character
+of M. Cloquet, and the motiveless folly of such a course, compel us to
+reject the first; the second can hardly be believed, as the patient had
+not the appearance of being drugged, and the possession of such a secret
+would be almost as valuable as the art in question itself. The doctrine
+of animal magnetism we cannot receive, on account of the want of
+uniformity and exactitude in the experiments; and I think, we are fairly
+driven to take refuge in the force of the imagination. Before doing
+this, however, we ought to make considerable allowances for
+exaggerations, colouring, and the different manner in which men are apt
+to regard the same thing. My young American friend, who _did_ believe in
+animal magnetism, viewed several of the facts I have related with eyes
+more favourable than mine, although even he was compelled to allow that
+M. C---- had much greater success with himself, than with your humble
+servant.
+
+
+
+
+LETTER XXIII.
+
+
+Preparations for Departure.--My Consulate.--Leave
+Paris.--Picardy.--Cressy.--Montreuil.--Gate of Calais.--Port of
+Calais.--Magical Words.
+
+
+To R. COOPER, ESQ., COOPERSTOWN.
+
+We entered France in July, 1826, and having remained in and about the
+French capital until February, 1828, we thought it time to change the
+scene. Paris is effectually the centre of Europe, and a residence in it
+is the best training an American can have, previously to visiting the
+other parts of that quarter of the world. Its civilisation, usages, and
+facilities take the edge off our provincial admiration, remove
+prejudices, and prepare the mind to receive new impressions, with more
+discrimination and tact. I would advise all our travellers to make this
+their first stage, and then to visit the North of Europe, before
+crossing the Alps or the Pyrenees. Most people, however, hurry into the
+South, with a view to obtain the best as soon as possible; but it is
+with this, as in most of our enjoyments, a too eager indulgence defeats
+its own aim.
+
+We had decided to visit London, where the season, _or winter_, would
+soon commence. The necessary arrangements were made, and we sent round
+our cards of p.p.c. and obtained passports. On the very day we were to
+quit Paris, an American friend wrote me a note to say that a young
+connexion of his was desirous of going to London, and begged a place for
+her in my carriage. It is, I believe, a peculiar and a respectable trait
+in the national character, that we so seldom hesitate about asking, or
+acceding to, favours of this sort. Whenever woman is concerned, our own
+sex yield, and usually without murmuring. At all events, it was so with
+W----, who cheerfully gave up his seat in the carriage to Miss ----, in
+order to take one in the _coupe_ of the diligence. The notice was so
+short, and the hour so late, that there was no time to get a passport
+for him, and, as he was included in mine, I was compelled to run the
+risk of sending him to the frontiers without one. I was a consul at the
+time,--a titular one as to duties, but in reality as much of a consul as
+if I had ever visited my consulate.[34] The only official paper I
+possessed, in connexion with the office, the commission and _exequatur_
+excepted, was a letter from the Prefet of the Rhone, acknowledging the
+receipt of the latter. As this was strictly a French document, I gave it
+to W---- as proof of my identity, accompanied by a brief statement of
+the reasons why he was without a passport, begging the authorities at
+Need to let him pass as far as the frontier, where I should be in season
+to prove his character. This statement I signed as consul, instructing
+W---- to show it, if applied to for a passport; and if the gendarmes
+disavowed me, to show the letter, by way of proving who I was. The
+expedient was clumsy enough, but it was the best that offered.
+
+[Footnote 34: There being so strong a propensity to cavil at American
+facts, lest this book might fall into European hands, it may be well to
+explain a little. The consulate of the writer was given to him solely to
+avoid the appearance of going over to the enemy, during his residence
+abroad. The situation conferred neither honour nor profit, there being
+no salary, and, in his case, not fees enough to meet the expense of the
+office opened by a deputy. The writer suspects he was much too true to
+the character and principles of his native country, to be voluntarily
+selected by its Government as the object of its honours or rewards, and
+it is certain he never solicited either. There are favours, it would
+seem, that are reserved, in America, for those who most serve the
+interests of her enemies! A day of retribution will come.]
+
+This arrangement settled, we got into the carriage, and took our leave
+of Paris. Before quitting the town, however, I drove round to the Rue
+d'Anjou, to take my leave of General Lafayette. This illustrious man had
+been seriously ill for some weeks, and I had many doubts of my ever
+seeing him again. He did not conceive himself to be in any danger,
+however; but spoke of his speedy recovery as a matter of course, and
+made an engagement with me for the ensuing summer. I bade him adieu,
+with a melancholy apprehension that I should never see him again.
+
+We drove through the gates of Paris, amid the dreariness of a winter's
+evening. You are to understand that everybody quits London and Paris
+just as night sets in. I cannot tell you whether this is caprice, or
+whether it is a usage that has arisen from a wish to have the day in
+town, and a desire to relieve the monotony of roads so often travelled,
+by sleep; but so it is. We did not fall into the fashion simply because
+it is a fashion, but the days are so short in February in these high
+latitudes, that we could not make our preparations earlier.
+
+I have little agreeable to say concerning the first forty miles of the
+journey. It rained; and the roads were, as usual, slippery with mud, and
+full of holes. The old _paves_ are beginning to give way, however, and
+we actually got a bit of _terre_ within six posts of Paris. This may be
+considered a triumph of modern civilisation; for, whatever may be said
+and sung in favour of Appian ways and Roman magnificence, a more cruel
+invention for travellers and carriage-wheels, than these _paves_, was
+never invented. A real Paris winter's day is the most uncomfortable of
+all weather. If you walk, no device of leather will prevent the moisture
+from penetrating to your heart; if you ride, it is but an affair of mud
+and _gras de Paris_. We enjoyed all this until nine at night, by which
+time we had got enough of it; and in Beauvais, instead of giving the
+order _a la poste_, the postilion was told to go to an inn. A warm
+supper and good beds put us all in good-humour again.
+
+In putting into the mouth of Falstaff the words, "Shall I not take mine
+ease in mine inn?" Shakspeare may have meant no more than the drowsy
+indolence of a glutton; but they recur to me with peculiar satisfaction
+whenever I get unbooted, and with a full stomach before the warm fire of
+an hotel, after a fatiguing and chilling day's work. If any man doubt
+whether Providence has not dealt justly by all of us in rendering our
+enjoyments dependent on comparative rather than on positive benefits,
+let him travel through a dreary day, and take his comfort at night in a
+house where everything is far below his usual habits, and learn to
+appreciate the truth. The sweetest sleep I have ever had has been caught
+on deck, in the middle watch, under a wet pee-jacket, and with a coil of
+rope for a pillow.
+
+Our next day's work carried us as far as Abbeville, in Picardy. Here we
+had a capital supper of game, in a room that set us all shivering with
+good honest cold. The beds, as usual, were excellent. The country
+throughout all this part of France, is tame and monotonous, with wide
+reaches of grain-lands that are now brown and dreary, here and there a
+wood, and the usual villages of dirty stonehouses. We passed a few
+hamlets, however, that were more than commonly rustic and picturesque,
+and in which the dwellings seemed to be of mud, and were thatched. As
+they were mostly very irregular in form, the street winding through them
+quite prettily, they would have been good in their way, had there been
+any of the simple expedients of taste to relieve their poverty. But the
+French peasants of this province appear to think of little else but
+their wants. There was occasionally a venerable and generous old vine
+clinging about the door, however, to raise some faint impressions of
+happiness.
+
+We passed through, or near, the field of Cressy. By the aid of the
+books, we fancied we could trace the positions of the two armies; but it
+was little more than very vague conjecture. There was a mead, a breadth
+of field well adapted to cavalry, and a wood. The river is a mere brook,
+and could have offered but little protection, or resistance, to the
+passage of any species of troops. I saw no village, and we may not have
+been within a mile of the real field, after all. Quite likely; no one
+knows where it is. It is very natural that the precise sites of great
+events should be lost, though our own history is so fresh and full, that
+to us it is apt to appear extraordinary. In a conversation with a
+gentleman of the Stanley family, lately, I asked him if Latham-House, so
+celebrated for its siege in the civil wars, was still in the possession
+of its ancient proprietors. I was told it no longer existed, and that,
+until quite recently, its positive site was a disputed point, and one
+which had only been settled by the discovery of a hole in a rock, in
+which shot had been cast during the siege, and which hole was known to
+have formerly been in a court. It is no wonder that doubts exist as to
+the identity of Homer, or the position of Troy.
+
+We have anglicised the word Cressy, which the French term Crecy, or, to
+give it a true Picard orthography, Creci. Most of the names that have
+this termination are said to be derived from this province. Many of them
+have become English, and have undergone several changes in the spelling.
+Tracy, or Tracey; de Courcy, or de Courcey; Montmorency; and Lacy, or
+Lacey, were once "Traci," "Courci," "Montmorenci," and "Laci." [35] The
+French get over the disgrace of their ancient defeats very ingeniously,
+by asserting that the English armies of old were principally composed of
+Norman soldiers, and that the chivalrous nobility which performed such
+wonders were of purely Norman blood. The latter was probably more true
+than the former.
+
+[Footnote 35: The celebrated Sir William Draper was once present when the
+subject turned on the descent of families, and the changes that names
+underwent. "Now my own is a proof of what I say," he continued, with the
+intention to put an end to a discourse that was getting to savour of
+family pride; "my family being directly derived from King Pepin." "How
+do you make that out, Sir William?" "By self-evident orthographical
+testimony, as you may see,--Pepin, Pipkin, Napkin, Diaper, Draper."]
+
+As we drew nearer to the coast, the country became more varied.
+Montreuil and Samer are both fortified; and one of these places,
+standing on an abrupt, rocky eminence, is quite picturesque and quaint.
+But we did not stop to look at anything very minutely, pushing forward,
+as fast as three horses could draw us, for the end of our journey. A
+league or two from Boulogne we were met by a half-dozen mounted runners
+from the different inns, each inviting us to give our custom to his
+particular employer. These fellows reminded me of the wheat-runners on
+the hill at Albany; though they were as much more clamorous and earnest,
+as a noisy protestation-making Frenchman is more obtrusive, than a
+shrewd, quiet, calculating Yankee. We did not stop in Boulogne to try
+how true were the voluble representations of these gentry, but, changing
+horses at the post, went our way. The town seemed full of English; and
+we gazed about us, with some curiosity, at a place that has become so
+celebrated by the great demonstration of Napoleon. There is a high
+monument standing at no great distance from the town, to commemorate one
+of his military parades. The port is small and crowded, like most of the
+harbours on both sides of the Channel.
+
+We had rain, and chills, and darkness, for the three or four posts that
+succeeded. The country grew more and more tame, until, after crossing an
+extensive plain of moist meadow-land, we passed through the gate of
+Calais. I know no place that will give you a more accurate notion of
+this celebrated port than Powles Hook. It is, however, necessary to
+enlarge the scale greatly, for Calais is a town of some size, and the
+hommock on which it stands, and the low land by which it is environed,
+are much more considerable in extent than the spot just named.
+
+We drove to the inn that Sterne has immortalised, or one at least that
+bears the same name, and found English comfort united with French
+cookery and French taste. After all, I do not know why I may not say
+French comforts too; for in many respects they surpass their island
+neighbours even in this feature of domestic comfort. It is a comfort to
+have a napkin even when eating a muffin; to see one's self entire in a
+mirror, instead of _edging_ the form into it, or out of it, sideways; to
+drink good coffee; to eat good _cotelettes;_ and to be able to wear the
+same linen for a day, without having it soiled. The Bible says, "Comfort
+me with flagons, or apples," I really forget which,--and if either of
+these is to be taken as authority, a _cotelette_ may surely be admitted
+into the _carte de conforts_.
+
+We found Calais a clear town, and pressing a certain medium aspect, that
+was as much English as French. The position is strong, though I was not
+much struck with the strength of the works. England has no motive to
+wish to possess it, now that conquest on the Continent is neither
+expedient nor possible. The port is good for nothing, in a warlike
+sense, except to protect a privateer or two; though the use of steam
+will probably make it of more importance in any future war, than it has
+been for the last two centuries.
+
+We found W---- safely arrived. At one of the frontier towns he had been
+asked for his passport, and in his fright he gave the letter of the
+Prefet of the Rhone, instead of the explanation I had so cleverly
+devised. This letter commenced with the words "Monsieur le Consul" in
+large letters, and occupying, according to French etiquette, nearly half
+of the first page. The gendarme, a _vieux moustache_, held his lantern
+up to read it, and seeing this ominous title, it would seem that
+Napoleon, and Marengo, and all the glories of the Consulate, arose in
+his imagination. He got no further than those three words, which he
+pronounced aloud; and then folding the letter, he returned it with a
+profound bow, asking no further questions. As the diligence drove on,
+W---- heard him say, "Apparemment vous avez un homme tres-considerable
+la-dedans, Monsieur le Conducteur." So much for our fears, for
+passports, and for gendarmes!
+
+We went to bed, with the intention of embarking for England in the
+morning.
+
+THE END
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's Recollections of Europe, by J. Fenimore Cooper
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