It was entirely owing to one of these misfortunes, or I had pass’d clean by the stables of Chantilly——
——But the postilion first affirming, and then persisting in it to my face, that there was no mark upon the two sous piece, I open’d my eyes to be convinced—and seeing the mark upon it as plain as my nose—I leap’d out of the chaise in a passion, and so saw everything at Chantilly in spite.——I tried it but for three posts and a half, but believe ’tis the best principle in the world to travel speedily upon; for as few objects look very inviting in that mood—you have little or nothing to stop you; by which means it was that I passed through St. Dennis, without turning my head so much as on one side towards the Abby——
——Richness of their treasury! stuff and nonsense!——bating their jewels, which are all false, I would not give three sous for any one thing in it, but Jaidas’s lantern——nor for that either, only as it grows dark, it might be of use.
CHAPTER XVII
Crack, crack——crack, crack——crack, crack——so this is Paris! quoth I (continuing in the same mood)—and this is Paris!——humph!——Paris! cried I, repeating the name the third time——
The first, the finest, the most brilliant——
The streets however are nasty.
But it looks, I suppose, better than it smells——crack, crack——crack, crack——what a fuss thou makest!—as if it concerned the good people to be informed, that a man with pale face and clad in black, had the honour to be driven into Paris at nine o’clock at night, by a postilion in a tawny yellow jerkin, turned up with red calamanco—crack, crack——crack, crack——crack, crack,——I wish thy whip——
——But ’tis the spirit of thy nation; so crack—crack on.
Ha!——and no one gives the wall!——but in the School of Urbanity herself, if the walls are besh-t—how can you do otherwise?
And prithee when do they light the lamps? What?—never in the summer months!——Ho! ’tis the time of sallads.——O rare! sallad and soup—soup and sallad—sallad and soup, encore——
——’Tis too much for sinners. 364
Now I cannot bear the barbarity of it; how can that unconscionable coachman talk so much bawdy to that lean horse? don’t you see, friend, the streets are so villainously narrow, that there is not room in all Paris to turn a wheelbarrow? In the grandest city of the whole world, it would not have been amiss, if they had been left a thought wider; nay, were it only so much in every single street, as that a man might know (was it only for satisfaction) on which side of it he was walking.
One—two—three—four—five—six—seven—eight—nine—ten.—Ten cook’s shops! and twice the number of barbers! and all within three minutes driving! one would think that all the cooks in the world, on some great merry-meeting with the barbers, by joint consent had said—Come, let us all go live at Paris: the French love good eating——they are all gourmands——we shall rank high; if their god is their belly——their cooks must be gentlemen: and forasmuch as the periwig maketh the man, and the periwig-maker maketh the periwig—ergo, would the barbers say, we shall rank higher still—we shall be above you all—we shall be Capitouls2 at least—pardi! we shall all wear swords——
—And so, one would swear (that is, by candle light,—but there is no depending upon it) they continue to do, to this day.
CHAPTER XVIII
The French are certainly misunderstood:——but whether the fault is theirs, in not sufficiently explaining themselves; or speaking with that exact limitation and precision which one would expect on a point of such importance, and which, moreover, is so likely to be contested by us——or whether the fault may not be altogether on our side, in not understanding their language always so critically as to know “what they would be at”——I shall not decide; but ’tis evident to me, when they affirm, “That they who have seen Paris, have seen everything,” they must mean to speak of those who have seen it by day-light.
As for candle-light—I give it up——I have said before, there was no depending upon it—and I repeat it again; but not because the lights and shades are too sharp—or the tints confounded—or that there is neither beauty or keeping, &c. . . . for that’s not truth—but it is an uncertain light in this respect, That in all the five hundred grand Hôtels, which they number up 365 to you in Paris—and the five hundred good things, at a modest computation (for ’tis only allowing one good thing to a Hôtel), which by candle-light are best to be seen, felt, heard, and understood (which, by the bye, is a quotation from Lilly)——the devil a one of us out of fifty, can get our heads fairly thrust in amongst them.
This is no part of the French computation: ’tis simply this,
That by the last survey taken in the year one thousand seven hundred and sixteen, since which time there have been considerable argumentations, Paris doth contain nine hundred streets; (viz.)
In the quarter called the City—there are fifty-three streets.
In St. James of the Shambles, fifty-five streets.
In St. Oportune, thirty-four streets.
In the quarter of the Louvre, twenty-five streets.
In the Palace Royal, or St. Honorius, forty-nine streets.
In Mont. Martyr, forty-one streets.
In St. Eustace, twenty-nine streets.
In the Halles, twenty-seven streets.
In St. Dennis, fifty-five streets.
In St. Martin, fifty-four streets.
In St. Paul, or the Mortellerie, twenty-seven streets.
The Greve, thirty-eight streets.
In St. Avoy, or the Verrerie, nineteen streets.
In the Marais, or the Temple, fifty-two streets.
In St. Antony’s, sixty-eight streets.
In the Place Maubert, eighty-one streets.
In St. Bennet, sixty streets.
In St. Andrews de Arcs, fifty-one streets.
In the quarter of the Luxembourg, sixty-two streets.
And in that of St. Germain, fifty-five streets, into any of which you may walk; and that when you have seen them with all that belongs to them, fairly by day-light—their gates, their bridges, their squares, their statues - - - and have crusaded it moreover, through all their parish-churches, by no means omitting St. Roche and Sulpice - - - and to crown all, have taken a walk to the four palaces, which you may see, either with or without the statues and pictures, just as you chuse—
——Then you will have seen——
——but, ’tis what no one needeth to tell you, for you will read of it yourself upon the portico of the Louvre, in these words,
3EARTH NO SUCH FOLKS!—NO FOLKS E’ER SUCH A TOWN
AS PARIS IS!—SING, DERRY, DERRY, DOWN. 366
The French have a gay way of treating everything that is Great; and that is all can be said upon it.