Our way to this place lay through Boulogne; the situation of which is
pleasing, and the fish there excellent. I was glad to see Boulogne,
though I can scarcely tell why; but one is always glad to see something
new, and talk of something old: for example, the story I once heard of
Miss Ashe, speaking of poor Dr. James, who loved profligate conversation
dearly,--"That man should set up his quarters across the water," said
she; "why Boulogne would be a seraglio to him."
The country, as far as Montreuil, is a coarse one; _thin herbage in the
plains and fruitless fields_. The cattle too are miserably poor and
lean; but where there is no grass, we can scarcely expect them to be
fat: they must not feed on wheat, I suppose, and cannot digest tobacco.
Herds of swine, not flocks of sheep, meet one's eye upon the hills; and
the very few gentlemen's feats that we have passed by, seem out of
repair, and deserted. The French do not reside much in private houses,
as the English do; but while those of narrower fortunes flock to the
country towns within their reach, those of ampler purses repair to
Paris, where the rent of their estate supplies them with pleasures at no
very enormous expence. The road is magnificent, like our old-fashioned
avenue in a nobleman's park, but wider, and paved in the middle: this
convenience continued on for many hundred miles, and all at the king's
expence. Every man you meet, politely pulls off his hat _en passant_;
and the gentlemen have commonly a good horse under them, but certainly a
dressed one.
Sporting season is not come in yet, but, I believe the idea of sporting
seldom enters any head except an English one: here is prodigious plenty
of game, but the familiarity with which they walk about and sit by our
road-side, shews they feel no apprehensions.
Harvest, even in France, is extremely backward this year, I see; no
crops are yet got in, nor will reaping be likely to pay its own charges.
But though summer is come too late for profit, the pleasure it brings is
perhaps enhanced by delay: like a life, the early part of which has been
wasted in sickness, the possessor finds too little time remaining for
work, when health _does_ come; and spends all that he has left,
naturally enough, in enjoyment.
The pert vivacity of _La Fille_ at Montreuil was all we could find there
worth remarking: it filled up my notions of French flippancy agreeably
enough; as no English wench would so have answered one to be sure. She
had complained of our avant-coureur's behaviour. "_Il parle sur le bant
ton, mademoiselle_" (said I), "_mais il à le coeur bon_[A]:" "_Ouydà_"
(replied she, smartly), "_mais c'est le ton qui fait le chanson_[B]."