"Monsieur!" said the postilion: "Monsieur!" he repeated; and he looked
round wistfully to see if any one was at hand. Now, I hate to be
interrupted in a reverie; and, indeed, I was so absorbed in the
wheelings of a kite over my head, that I was thinking of any thing but
of my lazy guide and my rolling wheels. A loud
clack--clack--slap--tap--crack--crack of the whip, flourished over his
head with all the gusto and the _savoir-craquer_ of a true postilion,
brought me to myself. "Monsieur, I have been waiting your orders here
for half an hour."
The coolness with which the fellow lied, disarmed me of my wrath in a
minute: I had else docked him of his pigtail, or broken the wooden sides
of his boots for him. But he had such an imperturbable air of
self-satisfaction, and he thrust his thumb so knowingly into his little
black pipe, and this again he plunged with such nonchalance into his
pocket, that I saw he was a philosopher of the true school--and I
profited by his example.
"Fellow," said I, "dost know that I have promised myself the pleasure of
passing half an hour with M. de Montlosier on my road to the baths: and
that at the rate thou takest me at, I shall not see Mont Dor till
to-morrow?"
"Don't be afraid, Monsieur: I know the Count's house well: we are not
more than an hour's drive from it: I go there with some one or other
every week; and as for Mont-Dor-les-bains, why--that depends on
Monsieur: if you get there by dark it will do, I suppose--the provisions
will not all be eaten, nor the beds filled!"
Lucky fellow to live in a world where no greater stimulus to labour
exists than here! why should we toil and wear ourselves to death as we
do in England for the mere means of living--and forget the lapse of life
itself? So, pocketing my dignity, and also pocketing sundry specimens of
my mute companions the stones, I mounted into the cabriolet--and lost
myself once more in my thoughts till I arrived at the Ferme de Randan.
Just where the Puy de Vache circles round with two other red hollow
craters, and at the end of a black sea of lava, stood the philosopher's
house: a plain low building: half farm half cottage: with a few trees
and enclosures shutting it in, and two or three acres of garden-ground
bringing up the rear. There was an air of simplicity about the whole
exceedingly striking, and the more so if one thought of the
simple-minded man who dwelt within. My name was announced: my letters of
introduction presented: and the Comte de Montlosier welcomed me to his
mountain home.
"You see me here, sir," he said, "quite a farmer; I am tired of the busy
world: who would not be, after having lived in it so long, and after
having seen such events? I can here give myself up to my books: I can
speculate on the wonders of this remarkable district, I can attend to my
little property--for I have not much remaining--and I can receive my
friends. You would not believe it, but Dr D---- of Oxford was with me
last week: he came to look at our volcanoes, and he stayed with me
several days: a charming little man, sir, and very active in climbing
over hills. You will excuse me, perhaps, if I do not offer to accompany
you to the summit of the Puy de Vache: but my servants are at your
orders: had I as few years over my head as when I first visited
Arthur's Seat, I would be at your side in all your mountain rambles; but
age and ease are fond of keeping company."
"Ah, Monsieur le Comte, I came to make your acquaintance; your hills I
will see at another time."
"Young man, you are wrong: these volcanic mountains are worthy of your
deepest study; for myself, I am nothing but a broken-down old man. I
have nothing here attractive to my friends. The spot is full of charms
for myself, but not for others. I have so many old associations
connected with it: 'tis my paternal estate: I had to fly from it during
those terrible days, and I never thought to see it again: but now that I
find myself once more restored to it, my unwillingness to quit the place
increases every day. After all, you can learn more about Auvergne from
your learned countryman, Poulett Scrope, than from me; my little work,
by the way, is at your service if you will accept it: I am as a lamp
going out, you find me flickering, and when next you pass this way, the
light may be extinguished."
"True, sir; and it is from these expiring flames that the brightest
sparks may be sometimes derived: at any rate I would know from you
wherewith to trim my own lamp for future days."
"Alas," replied the Count, "the present generation are not willing to
give credit to the last for all they have witnessed, for all they have
undergone. Had you, like me, seen all the phases of the Revolution, from
the time when I was sent as a deputy to the States-General from
Auvergne, to the Reign of Terror, and then the time of exile, and if you
could have felt the joys of returning to your longlost home again, you
might indeed look back on your life with emotion--let me say with
gratitude."
"Did you know many members of the literary and scientific world previous
to the Revolution?"
"Oh yes, I was acquainted with Condorcet, Lavoisier, and many others of
that stamp. Who shall say that, in the deaths of those great men, France
did not lose more than she gained by all her boasted freedom? Ah yes,
the men of those days were giants in intellect! there was a force of
originality in them, a vividness of thought and expression, which we
shall never witness again: and, allow me to say, there was a dignity
surrounding them, and accompanying them, which, with all our pretended
liberality and respect for science, we are far from attributing to their
followers now. Those of us, the actors in some of those tremendous
scenes who still survive, are but as the blasted oaks of the forest
after the hurricane has swept by. Some few remain erect; but withered,
scorched, and leafless: all the rest are prostrate, snapped off at the
root--many in the full vigour of vegetation: all now rotting on the
ground. It was a national tempest--a tornado--an earthquake; it was like
an eruption from the very volcano in whose bosom we are now sitting and
talking. The world never has seen, and perhaps never shall see, any
thing half so terrible as our Revolution. My young friend, excuse me;
perhaps you are a politician--and you are newly arrived in France:
things are tending to something ominous even at the present day. M. de
Polignac has just been summoned to office: the king is an easy good
man--a perfect gentleman--and an honest one, too; but there are people
near the throne who would be glad to see it tottering, and who are ready
to take advantage of the least false step. Mark my words, sir, another
year will produce something decisive in the history of France."
"But surely, M. le Comte, every thing is too much consolidated since the
Restoration of Louis XVIII. to allow of any fresh changes--the French
nation have all the liberty they can desire."
"Much more, my dear sir, than they either understand or can enjoy
properly. I am ashamed to say it, but my fellow countrymen are children
in constitutional matters: every thing depends on the personal character
of our governors for the time being. And again, we are too ambitious;
every body wants to rise--by fair means or by foul; but rise he must:
and every body expects to be a gainer by change. We are, and I am afraid
we always shall be, fond of playing at revolutions."
"Permit me to think better of the French, sir. I am delighted with their
country, and I wish them all the happiness that the possession of so
fine a territory can cause."
"You are right: it is a fine territory: it might be the first
agricultural country in Europe: there is hardly a square league of
ground in it that is not suitable to some useful vegetable production.
We have none of the cold clays nor barren heathtracts of Great Britain;
our mountains all admit of pasturage to their tops, or are productive of
wood; and our climate is so genial that even the bare limestone rocks of
Provence yield, as you are aware, the finest grapes. Here, in the midst
of the Monts Dor, you will come upon those vast primaeval forests of the
silver-fir which have never been disturbed from the time of their
erection, and you will judge for yourself how rich even this district
really is. Look at our rivers: at our boundless plains, covered with
corn and wine, and oil: and yet allowed to stand fallow one year in
three. My good friends in Scotland--for, believe me, I shall ever
remember with gratitude my stay in Edinburgh--do not farm their lands in
our slovenly fashion. France, depend upon it, might be made, and I
believe it will ultimately become, one of the richest and most
prosperous countries of Europe. The wealth of England is fleeting: when
you come to lose India and others of your colonies--and 'twill be your
fate sooner or later, your power will, with your trade, fall to the
ground: and, like your predecessors in a similar career, the Portuguese
and the Dutch, you must infallibly become a second or third-rate power.
France is solid and compact: her wealth lies in her land: you cannot
break up that: she exists now, and is great without any colony worthy of
mention: and she cannot but increase. Even Spain, from her mere
geographical size and position, has a better chance of political
longevity than England."
"And yet Spain is rather decrepid at present, you will admit, M. le
Comte."
"True; but a century, you know, is nothing in the life of a
nation:--England, to speak the truth, was only a second-rate power until
the reign of George the Second. She has still her social revolution to
go through: and whatever has been effected for the benefit of this
country would have come without the Revolution: and it was paying rather
dear to destroy the whole framework of society for what we should
certainly have attained by easy and more natural means. It is a fearful
catastrophe to break up all the old ideas and feelings of a people,
merely to substitute in their place something new--you know not what:
better or worse--and most probably the latter. Add to this, that the
results of the Revolution have fully borne out what I maintain: we are
neither better nor happier than we should have been had we gone on as
usual: other countries which have not been revolutionised are just as
happy and prosperous as we are."
"But then the more equal distribution of property, M. le Comte; has not
this effected some good?"
"_Some_ it may have caused undoubtedly; but much less than is imagined:
the effect of it has been only to raise up an aristocracy of money,
instead of one of birth: and, aristocracy for aristocracy, the former is
infinitely more overbearing and tyrannical than the latter. Before the
Revolution, the country was said to be in the hands of the nobles and
the clergy: what has happened since? It has merely been transferred to
those of the lawyers and the employes. Every third man you meet, holds
some place or other under government: and you can hardly transact the
commonest affairs of life without the aid of the notary or the advocate.
We cannot boast much of our comparative improvement in morality: for in
Paris, the prefect of police can inform you, from the registers of
births, that one in three children now born there is always
illegitimate."
"Of what good, then, has the Revolution been?"
"My young friend, ask not that question; it was one of those inscrutable
arrangements of Providence, the aim and extent of which we do not yet
know. You might as well ask what these puys and volcanoes have done to
benefit the country, which, no doubt, they once devastated; they may
even yet break out into activity again, and France may even yet have to
pass through another social trial. Things have not yet found their level
amongst us.--But we are getting into a long political and philosophical
discussion that makes me forget my duties to my guest. I am at least of
opinion that the volcanoes have done me personally some good; for they
have formed this wonderful country, and they attract hither many of my
friends, whom I might otherwise never have seen again. You will
appreciate them when you arrive at the Baths; and, apropos of this, I am
coming over there myself in a few days to consult my friend Dr Bertrand.
This will give me the opportunity of introducing you to several of the
visitors worth knowing. You will find a gay and gallant crowd there; and
let me advise you, take care of your heart and your pockets."
"Monsieur, dinner is served," said a domestic, opening the door; so I
followed the worthy Count into the salle-a-manger.