If you do not use _Herreis_' bills, I recommend to you at _Paris_, a
French, rather than an English banker; I have found the former more
profitable, and most convenient. I had, ten years since, a letter of
credit on _Sir John Lambert_, for £300, from _Mess. Hoares_. The
_Knight_ thought proper, however, to refuse the payment of a twenty
pound draft I gave upon him; though I had not drawn more than half my
credit out of his hands. _Mons. Mary_, on whom I had a draft from the
same respectable house, this year will not do _such things_; but on the
contrary, be ready to serve and oblige strangers to the utmost of his
power: he speaks and writes English very well, and will prove an
agreeable and useful acquaintance to a stranger in _Paris_. His sister
too, who lives with him, will be no less so to the female part of your
family. His house is in _Rue Saint Sauveur_.
The English bankers pay in silver, and it is necessary to take a
wheel-barrow with you to bring it away; a small bag will do at the
French bankers'.
There is as much difference between the bankers of _London_ and bankers
in _Paris_, as between a rotten apple and a sound one. You can hardly
get a word from a London banker, but you are sure of getting your money;
in _Paris_, you will get _words_ enough, and civil ones too. Remember,
however, I am speaking only of the treatment I have experienced. There
may be, and are, no doubt, English bankers at _Paris_ of great worth,
and respectable characters.
It is not reckoned very decent to frequent coffee-houses at _Paris_; but
the politeness of _Monsieur_ and _Madame Felix, au caffe de Conti_,
opposite the _Pont neuf_, and the English news-papers, render their
house a pleasant circumstance to me; and it is by much the best, and
best situated, of any in _Paris, au vois le monde_.
I am astonished, that where such an infinite number of people live in so
small a compass, (for _Paris_ is by no means so large as _London_) that
they should suffer the dead to be buried in the manner they do, or
within the city. There are several burial pits in _Paris_, of a
prodigious size and depth, in which the dead bodies are laid, side by
side, without any earth being put over them till the ground tier is
full; then, and not till then, a small layer of earth covers them, and
another layer of dead comes on, till by layer upon layer, and dead upon
dead, the hole is filled with a mass of human corruption, enough to
breed a plague; these places are enclosed, it is true, within high
walls; but nevertheless, the air cannot be _improved_ by it; and the
idea of such an assemblage of putrifying bodies, in one grave, so thinly
covered, is very disagreeable. The burials in churches too, often prove
fatal to the priests and people who attend; but every body, and every
thing in _Paris_, is so much alive, that not a soul thinks about the
dead.
I wish I had been born a Frenchman.--Frenchmen live as if they were
never to die. Englishmen die all _their lives_; and yet as _Lewis_ the
XIVth said, "I don't think it is so difficult a matter to die, as men
generally imagine, when they try in earnest."
I must tell you before I leave _Paris_, that I stept over to _Marli_, to
see the Queen; I had seen the King nine years ago; but he was not then a
King over eight millions of people, and the finest country under the
sun; yet he does not seem to lay so much stress upon his mighty power as
might be expected from so young a prince, but appears grave and
thoughtful. I am told he attends much to business, and endeavours to
make his subjects happy. His resolution to be inoculated, immediately
after succeeding to such a kingdom, is a proof of his having a great
share of fortitude. In England such a determination would have been
looked upon with indifference; but in France, where the bulk of the
people do not believe that it secures the patient from a second attack;
where the clergy in general consider it unfavourable, even in a
religious light; and where the physical people, for want of practice, do
not understand the management of the distemper, so as it is known in
England; I may venture to say, without being charged with flattery, that
it was an heroic resolution: add to this, the King knowing, that if his
subjects followed his example, it must be chiefly done by their own
surgeons and physicians, he put himself under their management alone,
though I think _Sutton_ was then at _Paris_.
The Queen is a fine figure, handsome, and very sprightly, dresses in
the present _gout_ of head dress, and without a handkerchief, and
thereby displays a most lovely neck.
I saw in a china shop at _Paris_, the figure of the King and Queen
finely executed, and very like, in china: the King is playing on the
harp, and the Queen dropping her work to listen to the harmony. The two
figures, about a foot high, were placed in an elegant apartment, and the
_toute ensemble_ was the prettiest toy I ever beheld: the price thirty
guineas.
I shall leave this town in a few days, and take the well-known and
well-beaten _route Anglois_ for _Calais_, thro' _Chantilly_, _Amiens_,
and _Boulogne_, and then I shall have twice crossed this mighty kingdom.