In my last I ran through the architecture of the middle ages in the south of France, and have now only a few observations to add of a more miscellaneous nature. The church of Nôtre Dame de Dom is seated on a rock which rises immediately from the Rhone, above the rest of the town, to the height of about 120 feet: all the remainder of the country to the east of the river, is a plain, bounded at a moderate distance by rugged hills, and beyond these by Mont Ventou, a bulky mountain, estimated to rise 6,000 feet above the Mediterranean. On the other side of the river, rocky hills come down to the water’s edge, crowned in several places with picturesque ruins. In the middle of the Rhone is a large island shaded with trees; and extending half way across the nearest branch of the stream, are the ruins of the ancient bridge of St. Benezet; the first perhaps of any consequence built by the nations of modern Europe. It was begun in 1177, during the most flourishing period of Avignon, when the government of that city was republican. Notwithstanding the expense of the erection, we are told that in 1179, the magistrates declared the inhabitants free from all imposts on that account. The bridge consisted of twenty-two arches, and was 1,200 paces in length; but like all ancient bridges, very narrow, the road-way not exceeding nine feet in width. Each arch is composed of four ribs, or series of vault stones, not bonded together. Like the Pont St. Esprit, it forms an elbow towards the current. On the first pier of the bridge is a chapel for the passengers to pay their devotions. This custom was probably derived from times when there was only a dangerous ferry, and travellers performed an act of piety, that they might not die unprepared. The old chapel was entered by a descending flight of steps, but as this was found inconvenient, a vault was inserted at half the height, and a new chapel built at the top of the old one; the first has a semicircular apsis with little columns, much like the Corinthian; the other is polygonal.

When Louis XIV. visited Avignon, the inhabitants, to do him honour, spread the whole of the bridge with velvet, and covered it with a canopy of silk. They did it, perhaps, as sacrifices are performed to evil deities, in order to avert the mischief they may occasion: but Louis, struck with this appearance of wealth and prosperity, in a town which did not belong to him, and not to be propitiated by their hospitality, destroyed the bridge, surrounded the place with custom-houses, ruined its trade, and thus drove the manufacturers to other places; and the city, which once boasted a population of eighty thousand souls, is now reduced to less than twenty thousand.

Avignon was a republic from 1134 to 1251. The popes came here (Clement V.) in 1309, and abandoned it in 1376. Two sham popes were here till 1403, from which time Avignon was governed by a vice-legate, deputed by the popes, till the revolution, when it was finally taken possession of by the French, and I suppose stands no chance of being restored. Nor is it desirable that it should, since being inclosed in France, it must always be in effect, subject to the government of that country. There is a museum and a public library; and I visited the house of one gentleman in the place, who has a fine collection of casts, and some pictures; but I did not find any thing very interesting.

Close by the church of Nôtre Dame de Dom are remains of the palace. It is said to have existed before the arrival of the popes, but if so, it was greatly enlarged and embellished by them. It is, or rather it has been, for great part is now in ruins, an immense, irregular pile of building, without the least pretension to beauty: one part is now become the prison of the city; another is converted into barracks; but the greater part has long ceased to be of any use. Like so many other old buildings in France, it is deeply stained with blood: the walls of the hall are still shewn where the antipope Benedict XIII. blew up his guests, and one of the towers was the scene of a still more horrible enormity, perpetrated during the bloody era of the revolution, from which it has received the name of the Tower of Massacre. No less than sixty-five persons of both sexes, accused of being aristocrats, were crowded into a little room in the upper part of it, and the ruling party amused themselves with shooting from the door amongst the prisoners. When, in this manner, all of them had been more or less disabled, the ruffians entered the room, and having made a hole in the vaulting which supported the floor, precipitated the miserable victims one by one to the bottom of the tower, a height of 80 or 100 feet; for the intermediate floors, if ever there were any, had all been destroyed. The cries of the wretched sufferers were still heard, and a quantity of quick lime was thrown down, at once to stifle them, and to destroy the bodies. The gratuitous excesses of this period make one shudder for human nature. History presents nothing to equal them; we find examples of individuals, indeed, whose highest enjoyment seems to have arisen from the sufferings of others; but here the mass of the population, a population professing itself christian, and boasting even of its high civilization, appear to have had no greater delight than to make their fellow creatures suffer; and late events shew this most execrable spirit still to exist in the south of France. The chapel of this place remains entire; it is a large, and even handsome room, of seven bays with two windows at each end.

I left Avignon on the evening of the 9th of August for Valence, where there is a very curious church, which I have already described. Close by it is a monument, which Millin says would merit an engraving; it did not strike me as particularly interesting, but the weather was so cold as to impede my drawing; an inconvenience I certainly did not expect in this latitude, at this time of year. On the 11th I again resumed my place in a diligence for Grenoble. The morning was cold, but fine, with clouds hanging over the distant mountains. The first striking object was Romans; situated in the valley of the Isere, wild and varied, but without any mixture of the terrible; in the midst of which the city occupies a charming situation. Soon after, we approach the mountains, high, broken, and savage. These and the river were on our right; on the left were high wooded hills, sometimes rocky, but not rising into mountains; and our route lay through a delightful valley well wooded, with vines on high trellises, and corn underneath them, or rather stubble, for little corn remained on the ground. Where there were no vines, we found mulberry-trees, and there is very little ground not shaded in one way or the other. Besides these, the valley produces abundance of noble walnut trees, and the woods, which are spread over the hills, contain a considerable quantity of fine timber. As for the shape of the mountains, those about Settle may give you some notion of them, only they are I suppose three times as high, and more steep and abrupt, especially about the entrance of the valley of Grenoble. The Isere there, makes a sudden bend, and the road turning with it, conducts us between two magnificent rocky masses, with a rich and fertile valley of about a mile wide between them. Grenoble stands at the edge of a plain which looks as if it had been a lake, watered by the Isere and the Drac. The former is still a considerable river, but thick and muddy. In walking about Grenoble, wherever the street has length enough in a line nearly straight to give any opening, one is sure to see a mountain or a precipice, with clouds hanging about it, or with snow lying in its hollows. The difference of vegetation, between this neighbourhood and Provence is very striking; the plants are much more like those of England, and such as I had left in seed at Nismes are here still in flower. I find again cherries and strawberries, and young peas; none of which I had seen since leaving Lyon. No figs; and though there are green-gages in the market, they are not ripe, while at Avignon they are almost over.

On the morning of the 13th I set off with a guide to the Grande Chartreuse, going by the longer and more practicable route, and proposing to return by the shorter. We passed fine cliffs and deep ravines, such as you would take a long ride to see in England; but one of the great charms of the scene arises from the noble chesnut and walnut trees which shade the sloping parts. Even to the mountain tops there is plenty of wood, and firs are seen crowning the most elevated precipices. We crossed what is called in Cumberland a hawse, but instead of finding barren moors at top, as would be the case there, we meet with farm-houses, meadows, woods, trees, hedges, and even corn-fields; the wheat, however, was far from ripe, and the oats were quite green. From the village of St. Laurent our course lies by a little mountain stream, called the Gaiers Mort. While the horses rested, I walked forward alone, coasting the stream, sometimes down on the banks, sometimes two or three hundred feet above them, and seeming to be rather in a rift in the mountain than in a valley. This opening is entered by a passage, where there is just room for the road and the river, between perpendicular rocks. An arch built across the road, marks the limit of the ancient domain of the Chartreuse. If you can figure to yourself Helkswood, at Ingleton, immensely magnified, you will have no bad idea of this pass. Similar scenery, sometimes with a little more space, sometimes with less, and varied by precipices more or less tremendously magnificent, accompanies us till nearly the end of our journey. The road descends sometimes almost to the bottom; at others, carries us on the edge of slopes, higher and steeper than the steep part of Boxhill, but always covered with wood; and sometimes we seem to look down quite perpendicularly on the noisy torrent below. At one point, a sudden turn in the road, where we cross the stream by a bridge, and begin to ascend the opposite side of the valley, presents a particularly fine assemblage of these objects. At last the scene opens, and we behold meadows, and a number of men employed in mowing them, and soon after, the Grande Chartreuse itself, an enormous, ugly pile of building, standing on the slope of a mountain, a situation unavoidable where there is no level ground. I walked round the lengthened corridors, and examined the apartments of the monks; each of which contains a sitting-room and bed-room, a light closet, places for wood, &c., and a little garden; but after the neglect of twenty-five years, every thing looks forlorn and desolate. Five old men are returned, more are expected, but the establishment is at present very poor; they hope however to receive a grant of the woods immediately about them, and to obtain some revenue from the sale of charcoal, and from that of planks, all of which must be sent on the backs of mules to find a market in the lower country.

I walked up among the woods, which are of fir and beech, but mostly of the first, to the chapel of St. Bruno, and returned to a supper on soupe maigre, an omelet, and bread and cheese. I had taken the precaution to provide a substantial meat pie at Grenoble, aware that the cheer here was not very good, but my guide had lost it, together with his own great coat, by the way. I then retired to sleep on a bag of straw between two brown blankets, for all the sheets belonging to the establishment were dirty; and the whole population being employed about the hay, there was no possibility of washing them. It appears that the climate of the Grande Chartreuse has not summer enough to ripen corn. The convent is every where surrounded by mountains and precipices. Opposite to it is a steep slope covered with wood to an immense height; in the immediate neighbourhood are meadows and pastures, rising on hills which are pretty steep, but not rocky. Indeed the soil must be good, for the vegetation is vigorous. Behind are steep woods; and above these, lofty precipices form the summit of the Granson, on which there remained a small portion of the last winter’s snow.

The next morning I returned to Grenoble, among scenery of the same character. We are so used to the barrenness of the upper parts of our own mountains, that an Englishman is astonished to observe so much good land in such elevated situations. From the vegetable productions I might very well have imagined myself in Surrey, if the occasional appearance of Pyrola secunda, Saxifraga rotundifolia, and a few other Alpine plants had not disturbed the reverie. On a more extensive view indeed the number of fir trees, mixed with the beech, gave a different character to the landscape; and towards the summit the woods were almost all of fir, with only scrubby beeches interspersed, and patches of snow were still lying among them. My guide made me observe some cattle near the summit. Here, as in other parts of France, these always have attendants to take care that they do not trespass, and to drive them home at night; even if there were hedges or other inclosures, which there are not, they could not be left out at night on account of the wolves. During winter, a dog left at night in any court or open place, among these mountains, is almost certainly destroyed before morning. The latter part of the journey I performed on foot, and was highly gratified by my walk.

The view from the descent into the vale of Grenoble is extremely fine, extending over the rich and fertile plain beneath; the cultivated hills rising around it, the woody mountains, occupying a still wider circuit, and the rocky Alps towering above all, and still retaining, and some of them always retaining, great beds of snow. It was indeed a magnificent perspective, yet not without some alloy; for the dense clouds and thick vapour very much obscured the prospect. I only saw at intervals, sometimes one, sometimes another part of the scene, and was led to imagine what the glorious whole would be in more favourable weather. The plain and the lower hills were always visible, sometimes a black mass of rocks would rise above the clouds, unconnected with any other earthly object; sometimes nothing was to be seen of a mountain but an illumined patch of snow shining through the mist. When I reached the bottom, I began to feel the weather very hot, and found they had been complaining much at Grenoble of the heat for the last two days.

Grenoble contains nothing interesting in point of architecture, but the cathedral claims our attention in another way, by preserving the tomb of Bayard, the chevalier “sans peur, et sans reproche,” a long tasteless Latin inscription records the fact; it begins,

One would have wished something of a very different character.

It was near one o’clock on Thursday, the 15th of August, before the diligence left Grenoble. The road winds along the charming valley of Gresivanda, presenting the richest views over its varied scenery. It was dark before we reached the frontiers of Savoy, and as I arrived at Chamberi at midnight, and left it at three o’clock the next morning, in a heavy rain, I shall not attempt a description. We reached Geneva about seven yesterday evening, but I postpone any account of this city, till I have seen a little more of it, and shall occupy the remaining part of my letter in answering yours. You ask me if I can really see nothing but buildings and mountains in France, or if I have at any time met with such phenomena as men and women. I will reply as well as I can to the spirit of this question; there are some observations on the French character which force themselves on the attention of the traveller, some of which, notwithstanding your sneer, I have already noticed. Whether there exist any attachment to the present dynasty is a question which I must answer in the negative. The French are willing to suffer the Bourbons, because they wish for peace, and there seems to be something of affection springing up towards the present king, which does not in the least extend itself to the other members of the reigning family. There is a widely diffused, and pretty generally received opinion of the moderation and good sense of the former, but the others are nowhere well spoken of. You will have seen in the French papers, accounts of the enthusiasm with which the Duke and Duchess of Angoulême were received on their late tour. I was not present at any place where they were, but I can form a tolerably correct idea of what I have not seen, from what I have. Lest however, you should be inclined to give more credit to the public journals than they deserve, I will give you a specimen of their courage in publishing the acceptable, rather than the true. It was stated in the Moniteur, while I was at Paris, that three hundred workmen were employed in the church of the Madelaine; I went there and found about twenty, who could not do much, as they were working without any plan, and it had not been decided whether the design of the Temple of Glory, adopted by Napoleon, should be continued, or some other preferred. The same paper asserted, that five hundred men were employed at St. Geneviève. My friend, Mr. Sharp, was drawing there every day; and as he saw nobody, he applied to the architect, who resides on the spot, to know where they were, but he also was entirely ignorant of their existence: a week after this, about a dozen men were set to work to take down the sculpture of the pediment, and to erase the inscription, Aux grands hommes la patrie reconnaissante.^[23] After this you will not wonder if I interpret the glowing accounts of the rejoicings in the south of France, by what I observed at Arles, where vive le roi was given out from the Hotel de Ville from time to time, and repeated by the children in the crowd, who were pleased with the fireworks. It is the municipal government which says all and does all on these occasions, the people are nothing. With respect to the transactions at Nismes, concerning which you think I must have collected many particulars, I am afraid that I can give you very little satisfaction. It seems to me that the Catholics were guilty of these excesses against the Protestants from superstition, and that they endeavoured to cover themselves by the pretence of zeal for the king; that the provincial government weakly lent itself to this feeling, of which indeed the members probably participated; and that the government of France, or at least their principal agent, the Duke of Angoulême, was unwilling to repress too strongly, a spirit, which whether considered in a religious or political point of view, his own prejudices taught him to consider as resting on a meritorious foundation, though carried to a culpable excess. At the same time some political circumstances had much inflamed this religious animosity, all of which however imply the previous existence of such a sentiment. The Protestants of Nismes form a body, whose consequence and respectability is proportionally much greater than their numbers. It is not to be wondered at, therefore, if under a government which made no distinctions, they should occupy a larger share of public situations, than in the eyes of the Catholics they were entitled to do. On the return of the king, therefore, the Catholics united to drive them out, and irritated by what appeared to them an act of injustice, the Protestants took the first opportunity to retaliate. Thus politics became an important part of the quarrel, but religion remains the ground-work. The prisons at Nismes are filled with Protestants, who are confined merely on a general charge of attachment to Napoleon, and in some instances, a renunciation of religion has been sufficient immediately to procure the prisoner his liberty. Now I have no authority to cite for all this; it is merely intelligence picked up on the spot, in conversation with Catholics and Protestants, and connected together as well as I could. I contend however, that it is better deserving of credit than any thing issuing from the French authorities, who are in fact some of the parties accused; better than the letter of the Duke of Wellington, who probably gave himself no trouble to investigate the circumstances, but adopted with little hesitation what those authorities were pleased to communicate. The letter of the minister, Olivia, I was not able to clear up while I was there, he having left the place, but I have since been informed by an Englishman, whom I casually met with, that he talked on the subject with Olivia himself, and that this minister expressly disclaimed the letter as it appeared in the English papers: he had written a letter to the secretary of the committee, and that he might not be subject to any imputation for so doing, he had first sent it to the Duke of Richelieu. The letter published contained some of his expressions and phrases, but the substance was materially altered.

Generally speaking, the prisons of the south of France are filled with prisoners for political offences, or rather for political opinions, and at Grenoble, the criminal tribunal is declared permanent. Yet, if the French are not attached to the present government, it does not appear that they have, in general, any aversion to it. They do not love Napoleon, but their dislike is deeply mixed with regret for the splendour and glory of his reign. They do not trouble their heads about young Napoleon, yet if he should prove a man of any talents, and the Bourbons should take any measures to excite alarm concerning the national property, it is probably to him they would look, because there is no other, whose claim would be readily admitted by the party opposed to the present system. With the exception of some men of talents, who wish to open that career of honourable ambition, which a popular government admits more than any other, I do not think they have any inclination for a second experiment of a republic. I hope Louis XVIII. will live eight or ten years longer at least, for I think it would give a chance, I fear the only chance, the French have for a constitution, round which they will generally rally against either anarchy or despotism. If the feeling is once^[24] fully called forth, they will soon improve their government; it may be an indifferent constitution at present, but such a union will gradually make it a good one, and I think it would be no small advantage to our own, to have liberty well understood and acted upon in a great neighbouring state. We submit to many inconveniences, and many abuses, because we fancy them inseparable from what we love and admire; if France were free, the difference of her prejudices and manners would show us the road in many instances, as we show it to her in others.