ÆT. 36.]

VISIT TO ROUEN-JOURNEY TO PARIS.

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covered a good heart, and very liberal opinions. Dreadfully wounded in spirit, like the rest of his countrymen, at the fall of French glory-as they falsely conceive it-a sort of hesitating friend of the Bourbons and peace-he, nevertheless, displayed to me a reverence for England, and her great patriotic spirit, which was at once flattering and sincere. His idea of our martial spirit was such that I needed to raise my voice, in bad and impetuous French, to convince him that, if Buonaparte-granting our navy to have been out of the question-had invaded England, he would not have succeeded. His dark, cold spirit seemed to be warmed, and even willingly enlightened, when I told him that a million of hearts of fire were ready united to overwhelm him. I was pleased at making something even of a skeptic. "Yes," he said, "it is very true: you are the greatest people that ever existed on the face of the earth. I wish to Heaven we had your liberty-your public spirit-your constitution!" This man, whom you would have imagined the last either to like or to listen to me, has literally haunted me ever since I came to Paris. He showed me, indeed, a real kindness, in giving up his lodgings the first night I arrived, in order (for he is a physician) that I might be sure of an aired bed. He showed me the greater part of Paris, and took me through l'Ecole de Médecine, and the libraries.

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I have met Mrs. Siddons !--In her company, to-day, I have visited the statutes in the Louvre, and traversed the Elysian Fields-the Elysian fields of France !-which are as contemptible, in comparison with our Hyde Park and the Green Park, as the public squares and buildings are superior. Of these it is impossible to convey any idea. The junction of the Palace by Buonaparte-the Column of Victory-the architecture of the whole, is what I felt myself unable to enjoy-only, because I had not my dearest friends around me.

To-day, as I said, we visited the statues in the Louvre. You may remember the launch of a ship, how it made us both shed tears; and what a weak creature I am, to be inclined, by a flood of associations, to tremble and shed tears among those monuments of genius! Yet you, my dear friend, would have felt the same emotion--for we so often feel alike. I am no judge of statuary: but the exquisite has always the effect I have described; and although even you, who know me well, might be forgiven for doubting it, yet the exquisite statuary in the Louvre, and all

its associations, produced the same effect. Far from wondering at the madness of the female, who fell in love with the Apollo, I thought her only a reasonable enthusiast. I could not command myself, and left Mrs. Siddons-glad to indulge the most absurd and pleasing of all tears. I know it is all imagination. Perhaps, unless told of it, I could not even discover either the Apollo or the Venus; yet, when convinced that I really saw the statues that enchant the world-the prodigies of two thousand years!--such associations rushed upon me, that I thought myself far transported into another world.

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T. C.

To another friend he hastily announces his arrival, and thus continues the glowing record of his impressions :

PARIS, September 8, 1814.

“ "Written in the Louvre, within two yards of the Apollo. I take out this sheet the moment I see the Apollo de Belvidere and the Venus de Medicis. Mrs. Siddons is with me. I could almost weep-indeed I must.

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T. C."

You

"I write this after returning from the Louvre. may imagine with what feelings I caught the first sight of Paris, and passed under Montmartre, the scene of the last battle between the French and Allies. . . . It was evening when we entered Paris. Next morning I met Mrs. Siddons; walked about with her, and then visited the Louvre together. Oh, how that immortal youth, Apollo, in all his splendor-majestydivinity-flashed upon us from the end of the gallery! What a torrent of ideas-classically associated with this godlike formrushed upon me at this moment! My heart palpitated—my eyes filled with tears-I was dumb with emotion.

"Here are a hundred other splendid statues-the Venusthe Menander-the Pericles-Cato and Portia-the father and daughter in an attitude of melting tenderness. . . . I wrote on the table where I stood with Mrs. Siddons, the first part of this letter in pencil-a record of the strange moments in which I felt myself suddenly transported, as it were, into a new world, and while standing between the Apollo and the Venus."

66

Coming home, I conclude a transcript of the day :-The effect of the statue-gallery was quite overwhelming-it was even distracting; for the secondary statues are things on which you might dote for a whole day; and while you are admiring one,

ET. 36.] PARIS-THE APOLLO-SCHLEGEL-HUMBOLDT.

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you seem to grudge the time, because it is not spent in admiring something else. Mrs. Siddons is a judge of statuary; but I thought I could boast of a triumph over them-in point of taste -when she and some others of our party preferred another Venus to the statue that enchants the world.' I bade them recollect the waist of the true Venus-the chest and the shoulders. We returned, and they gave in to my opinion, that these parts were beyond all expression. It was really a day of tremulous ecstacy. The young and glorious Apollo is happily still white in color. He seems as if he had just leapt from the sun! All pedantic knowledge of statuary falis away, when the most ignorant in the arts finds a divine presence in this great created form. Mrs. Siddons justly observed, that it gives one an idea of God himself having given power to catch, in such imitation, a ray of celestial beauty.

"The Apollo is not perfect; some parts are modern, and he is not quite placed on his perpendicular by his French transporters; but his head, his breast, and one entire thigh and leg, are indubitable. The whole is so perfect, that, at the full distance of the hall, it seems to blaze with proportion. The muscle that supports the head thrown back-the mouth, the brow, the soul that is in the marble, are not to be expressed.

"After such a subject, what a falling off it is to tell you I dined with human beings!-yea, verily, at a hotel with Mrs. Siddons, her family, and Segeant Best and party. We were all splendidly dressed-dined splendidly, and paid in proportion; yet I never paid fourteen shillings for a dinner with more pleasure. It was equal to any at Lord Holland's table-a profusion of luxuries and fruits fit to pall an epicure. After dinner we repaired to the Opera-a set of silly things, but with some exquisite music, at which even Mrs. Siddons-exhausted with admiring the Apollo-fell asleep. I should tell you, that last night I was alone at the Orphan of China,' and read the tragedy so as closely to follow, and feel the recitation. . .

...

"T. C."

PARIS, Sept. 12, 1814.

I have seen a good deal of French society at Madame de Staël's. Yesterday I dined with Schlegel and Humboldt, who are both very superior men, and with a host of Marquis and Marquises. After much entreaty, they made me repeat Lochiel.' I have made acquaintance also with Denon, the Egyptian traveller, who is a very pleasing person, and gave

me an admission to the sittings of the Academy. I have been also introduced to the Duke of Wellington at his house....

"Alas! all this is lost upon me, at this moment; for the noise and air of Paris are far from agreeing with me; and I must positively this day seek for lodgings some miles removed. I write near the Post-office-on purpose to save another journey to that place-in a street which makes me long for the silence of the Strand, and the smell of Fish-street-hill! But the dirt of Paris is too nauseous a subject; only you must excuse the insipidity of this epistle, when I tell you that I am literally shaken on my seat by the passing carriages. I have been at Versailles; it is very splendid indeed. The Louvre is now shut; it has been, to be sure, a treat beyond description. I am going to-day to the Jardin des Plantes. My stay in Paris will not exceed the 28th.

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T. C."

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PARIS, September 16, 1814.

"This morning was a dull and rainy one, and I was confined to my lodgings-but I received your letter. I sent a person whom the French call commissary—that is, a little ragged boy, without shoes or stockings-who brought it to me.

"I wrote to you (Sept. 8,) describing the sensations which I experienced at the new sights which Paris presented. The last sheet I sent you was entrusted to Sergeant Best. It was begun in pencil, within two yards of the Apollo of Belvidere. I was within the influence of the burning bush. Since then, though I might sing ça ira, in all other respects, a hurt which I got in my leg by an accidental fall at Dieppe, in tripping too lightly down stairs without counting the steps, festered into a sore, by allowing the wound to rub on a cotton stocking. Though I contrived for several days to hop about Paris in company with Mrs. Siddons, yet at last I was obliged to apply a poultice of herbs to the part, and to keep my chamber for the sake of rest. You must not imagine that it is anything serious-it is only a trifle; but rest is prudent, to ensure my future movements.

"In the meantime, I have visited only the catacombs in a coach; that is, a coach took me to the gate, from which you descend to the catacombs. My companions were Leslie, the Professor of Mathematics, from Edinburgh, and Dr. Goldie, Miller's friend, whom you have seen. Our party was pleasant, though the object of the visit was very dismal. The catacombs

ÆT. 36.]

PARIS-CATACOMBS-SIDDONS-KEMBLE.

31

of Paris are one hundred feet below the surface of the ground, and stretch for miles. The avenues, I think, are six feet high, through which we proceeded with tapers, and through bones and human skulls, piled on each side, to the amount of millions. Two millions is the number generally reckoned. This was a dreadful and gloomy curiosity, but one of the most extraordinary in Paris. There you see the remains of those that fell in the day of St. Bartholomew, and of the heroes that perished on the fatal 2d of September. But enough of this gloomy subject.

"I have been obliged to keep my room, but you see I have not lost my spirits. I look forward to happy days in Sydenham. To-morrow I shall change my lodgings, from a chamber literally six stories high, to one only three, and to all appearance a comfortable apartment. Imagine the cheapness of this place, when I dined well to-day for tenpence, at a good hotel, and got my coffee for sixpence. I often imagine, if the expenses of your family and mine were consolidated, how cheap and happy we could all live at Paris. No doubt things are uncomfortablethe floors are cold and dirty; they never change knives; a thousand things revolt an Englishman; but they are cheap, civil, and accommodating.

"I forgot to say that, the day before I began to keep the house, I saw the delivery of the Standards, in the Champs Elysées, and heard the king speak a few words in answer to the oath of twenty thousand men under arms. The spectacle was affecting and imposing. I shall never forget the shout of their oath! But yet they are such a light-hearted, vacillating people, that I give but little for either their oaths or their acclamations.

"I have been at the Theatre with the Siddons frequently, and once at a little Theatre with John Kemble-at a piece which pleased me a good deal. The tune of Henri IV. is often played; it is joyous and pleasant, and always raises my spirits.. When I have seen more of Paris, I shall have exquisite pleasure in describing whatever occurs"

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"Perhaps you will think it is the effect of the French climate to make me flatter; but you English women are as beautiful in comparison of the French, as I think we-even the handsomest Englishmen are inferior to the really handsome Frenchmen. As to the French women, I cannot describe to you my ideas of them. There are two sorts of them-the aquiline, or rather, nutcracker faces, and the broad faces: both are ugly. Perhaps,