On our way here we eat an humble meal; which was, nevertheless, a most
grateful _repas_, for it was under the principal arch of the _Pont du
Gard_. It will be needless to say more to you of this noble monument of
antiquity, than that the modern addition to it has not only made it more
durable, but more useful: in its original state, it conveyed only horse
and man, over the River _Gordon_, (perhaps _Gardon_) and water, to the
city of _Nismes_. By the modern addition, it now conveys every thing
over it, but water; as well as an high idea of Roman magnificence; for
beside the immense expence of erecting a bridge of a triple range of
arches, over a river, and thereby uniting the upper arches to the
mountains on each side, the source from whence the water was conveyed,
is six leagues distant from _Nismes_. The bridge is twenty-four _toises_
high, and above an hundred and thirty-three in length, and was _my sole
property_ for near three hours; for during that time, I saw neither man
nor beast come near it; every thing was so still and quiet, except the
murmuring stream which runs gently under two or three of the arches,
that I could almost have persuaded myself, from the silence, and rude
scenes which every way presented themselves, that all the world were as
dead as the men who erected it. That side of the bridge where none of
the modern additions appear, is nobly fillagreed by the hand of time;
and the other side is equally pleasing, by being a well executed support
to a building which, without its aid, would in a few ages more have
fallen into ruins.
I was astonished to find so fine a building standing in so pleasant a
spot, and which offers so many invitations to make it the abode of some
hermit, quite destitute of such an inhabitant; but it did not afford
even a beggar, to tell the strange stories which the common people
relate; tho' it could not fail of being a very lucrative post, were it
only from the bounty of strangers, who visit it out of curiosity; but a
Frenchman, whether monk, or mumper, has no idea of a life of solitude:
yet I am sure, were it in England, there are many of our, _first-rate
beggars_, who would lay down a large sum for a money of _such a walk_.
If a moiety of sweeping the kennel from the Mews-gate to the Irish
coffee-house opposite to it, could fetch a good price, and I was a
witness once that it did, to an unfortunate beggar-woman, who was
obliged by sickness to part with half of it; what might not a beggar
expect, who had the _sweeping_ of the _Pont du Gard_; or a monk, who
erected a confessional box near it for the benefit of _himself_, and the
fouls of poor travellers?
After examining every part of the bridge, above and below, I could not
find the least traces of any ancient inscription, except three initial
letters, C, P, A; but I found cut in _demi relief_ very extraordinary
kind of _priapus_, or rather group of them; the country people, for it
is much effaced, imagine it to be dogs in pursuit of a hare; but if I
may be permitted to _imagine_ too perhaps, indeed, with no better
judgment, might not the kind of representations be emblematical of the
populousness, of the country? though more probably the wanton fancies of
the master mason, or his journeymen; for they are too diminutive pieces
of work to bear any proportion to the whole, and are therefore
blemishes, not ornaments, even allowing that in those ages such kind of
works were not considered in the light they would be in these days of
more delicacy and refinement.