BOULOGNE, June 13, 1765.
DEAR SIR,--I am at last in a situation to indulge my view with a sight
of Britain, after an absence of two years; and indeed you cannot
imagine what pleasure I feel while I survey the white cliffs of Dover,
at this distance. Not that I am at all affected by the nescia qua
dulcedine natalis soli, of Horace. That seems to be a kind of
fanaticism founded on the prejudices of education, which induces a
Laplander to place the terrestrial paradise among the snows of Norway,
and a Swiss to prefer the barren mountains of Solleure to the fruitful
plains of Lombardy. I am attached to my country, because it is the land
of liberty, cleanliness, and convenience: but I love it still more
tenderly, as the scene of all my interesting connexions; as the
habitation of my friends, for whose conversation, correspondence, and
esteem, I wish alone to live.
Our journey hither from Lyons produced neither accident nor adventure
worth notice; but abundance of little vexations, which may be termed
the Plagues of Posting. At Lyons, where we stayed only a few days, I
found a return-coach, which I hired to Paris for six loui'dores. It was
a fine roomy carriage, elegantly furnished, and made for travelling; so
strong and solid in all its parts, that there was no danger of its
being shaken to pieces by the roughness of the road: but its weight and
solidity occasioned so much friction between the wheels and the
axle-tree, that we ran the risque of being set on fire three or four
times a day. Upon a just comparison of all circumstances posting is
much more easy, convenient, and reasonable in England than in France.
The English carriages, horses, harness, and roads are much better; and
the postilions more obliging and alert. The reason is plain and
obvious. If I am ill-used at the post-house in England, I can be
accommodated elsewhere. The publicans on the road are sensible of this,
and therefore they vie with each other in giving satisfaction to
travellers. But in France, where the post is monopolized, the
post-masters and postilions, knowing that the traveller depends
intirely upon them, are the more negligent and remiss in their duty, as
well as the more encouraged to insolence and imposition. Indeed the
stranger seems to be left intirely at the mercy of those fellows,
except in large towns, where he may have recourse to the magistrate or
commanding officer. The post stands very often by itself in a lone
country situation, or in a paultry village, where the post-master is
the principal inhabitant; and in such a case, if you should be
ill-treated, by being supplied with bad horses; if you should be
delayed on frivolous pretences, in order to extort money; if the
postilions should drive at a waggon pace, with a view to provoke your
impatience; or should you in any shape be insulted by them or their
masters; and I know not any redress you can have, except by a formal
complaint to the comptroller of the posts, who is generally one of the
ministers of state, and pays little or no regard to any such
representations. I know an English gentleman, the brother of an earl,
who wrote a letter of complaint to the Duc de Villars, governor of
Provence, against the post-master of Antibes, who had insulted and
imposed upon him. The duke answered his letter, promising to take order
that the grievance should be redressed; and never thought of it after.
Another great inconvenience which attends posting in France, is that if
you are retarded by any accident, you cannot in many parts of the
kingdom find a lodging, without perhaps travelling two or three posts
farther than you would choose to go, to the prejudice of your health,
and even the hazard of your life; whereas on any part of the post-road
in England, you will meet with tolerable accommodation at every stage.
Through the whole south of France, except in large cities, the inns are
cold, damp, dark, dismal, and dirty; the landlords equally disobliging
and rapacious; the servants aukward, sluttish, and slothful; and the
postilions lazy, lounging, greedy, and impertinent. If you chide them
for lingering, they will continue to delay you the longer: if you
chastise them with sword, cane, cudgel, or horse-whip, they will either
disappear entirely, and leave you without resource; or they will find
means to take vengeance by overturning your carriage. The best method I
know of travelling with any degree of comfort, is to allow yourself to
become the dupe of imposition, and stimulate their endeavours by
extraordinary gratifications. I laid down a resolution (and kept it) to
give no more than four and twenty sols per post between the two
postilions; but I am now persuaded that for three-pence a post more, I
should have been much better served, and should have performed the
journey with much greater pleasure. We met with no adventures upon the
road worth reciting. The first day we were retarded about two hours by
the dutchess D--lle, and her son the duc de R--f--t, who by virtue of
an order from the minister, had anticipated all the horses at the post.
They accosted my servant, and asked if his master was a lord? He
thought proper to answer in the affirmative, upon which the duke
declared that he must certainly be of French extraction, inasmuch as he
observed the lilies of France in his arms on the coach. This young
nobleman spoke a little English. He asked whence we had come; and
understanding we had been in Italy, desired to know whether the man
liked France or Italy best? Upon his giving France the preference, he
clapped him on the shoulder, and said he was a lad of good taste. The
dutchess asked if her son spoke English well, and seemed mightily
pleased when my man assured her he did. They were much more free and
condescending with my servant than with myself; for, though we saluted
them in passing, and were even supposed to be persons of quality, they
did not open their lips, while we stood close by them at the inn-door,
till their horses were changed. They were going to Geneva; and their
equipage consisted of three coaches and six, with five domestics
a-horseback. The dutchess was a tall, thin, raw-boned woman, with her
head close shaved. This delay obliged us to lie two posts short of
Macon, at a solitary auberge called Maison Blanche, which had nothing
white about it, but the name. The Lionnois is one of the most agreeable
and best-cultivated countries I ever beheld, diversified with hill,
dale, wood, and water, laid out in extensive corn-fields and rich
meadows, well stocked with black cattle, and adorned with a surprising
number of towns, villages, villas, and convents, generally situated on
the brows of gently swelling hills, so that they appear to the greatest
advantage. What contributes in a great measure to the beauty of this,
and the Maconnois, is the charming pastoral Soame, which from the city
of Chalons winds its silent course so smooth and gentle, that one can
scarce discern which way its current flows. It is this placid
appearance that tempts so many people to bathe in it at Lions, where a
good number of individuals are drowned every summer: whereas there is
no instance of any persons thus perishing in the Rhone, the rapidity of
it deterring every body from bathing in its stream. Next night we
passed at Beaune where we found nothing good but the wine, for which we
paid forty sols the bottle. At Chalons our axle-tree took fire; an
accident which detained us so long, that it was ten before we arrived
at Auxerre, where we lay. In all probability we must have lodged in the
coach, had not we been content to take four horses, and pay for six,
two posts successively. The alternative was, either to proceed with
four on those terms, or stay till the other horses should come in and
be refreshed. In such an emergency, I would advise the traveller to put
up with the four, and he will find the postilions so much upon their
mettle, that those stages will be performed sooner than the others in
which you have the full complement.
There was an English gentleman laid up at Auxerre with a broken arm, to
whom I sent my compliments, with offers of service; but his servant
told my man that he did not choose to see any company, and had no
occasion for my service. This sort of reserve seems peculiar to the
English disposition. When two natives of any other country chance to
meet abroad, they run into each other's embrace like old friends, even
though they have never heard of one another till that moment; whereas
two Englishmen in the same situation maintain a mutual reserve and
diffidence, and keep without the sphere of each other's attraction,
like two bodies endowed with a repulsive power. We only stopped to
change horses at Dijon, the capital of Burgundy, which is a venerable
old city; but we passed part of a day at Sens, and visited a
manufacture of that stuff we call Manchester velvet, which is here made
and dyed to great perfection, under the direction of English workmen,
who have been seduced from their own country. At Fontainebleau, we went
to see the palace, or as it is called, the castle, which though an
irregular pile of building, affords a great deal of lodging, and
contains some very noble apartments, particularly the hall of audience,
with the king's and queen's chambers, upon which the ornaments of
carving and gilding are lavished with profusion rather than propriety.
Here are some rich parterres of flower-garden, and a noble orangerie,
which, however, we did not greatly admire, after having lived among the
natural orange groves of Italy. Hitherto we had enjoyed fine summer
weather, and I found myself so well, that I imagined my health was
intirely restored: but betwixt Fontainebleau and Paris, we were
overtaken by a black storm of rain, sleet, and hail, which seemed to
reinstate winter in all its rigour; for the cold weather continues to
this day. There was no resisting this attack. I caught cold
immediately; and this was reinforced at Paris, where I stayed but three
days. The same man, (Pascal Sellier, rue Guenegaud, fauxbourg St.
Germain) who owned the coach that brought us from Lyons, supplied me
with a returned berline to Boulogne, for six loui'dores, and we came
hither by easy journeys. The first night we lodged at Breteuil, where
we found an elegant inn, and very good accommodation. But the next we
were forced to take up our quarters, at the house where we had formerly
passed a very disagreeable night at Abbeville. I am now in tolerable
lodging, where I shall remain a few weeks, merely for the sake of a
little repose; then I shall gladly tempt that invidious straight which
still divides you from--Yours, &c.