scene that greets his eye, watches the shiftings of the landscape, is entertained with the strange costume of the natives, and gratified by their civility; the unusual mode of conveyance is rather amusing from its novelty and the means which it affords of leisurely observation, than annoying from its tardiness and bustle; he is content, in short, to become for a season, an interested sharer in the general movement, and to postpone, until a happier, though scarcely a more pleasant hour, the attachments of country and the emotions of home. The same cast of observation will apply to the multifarious cargo of a Paris Diligence. Here, the man with uncombed hair and dirty neckcloth, climbs to the roof, unless on a rainy day he should have dexterity enough to make interest with the guard, and then with his shaggy coat, like a great wet water-dog, he takes his seat by your side, and dries himself at leisure. There, the gentleman with foul linen and unwashen hands, takes place beside you, and exhausts himself in efforts to make the agreeable. What is to be done in this case ?-Put on the sullens or affect drowsiness ?-No, a wise man will listen with attention, repay courtesy with courtesy, and will thus gain a lesson, if in nothing else, at least in sçavoir vivre. Bat, in truth, however disagreeable these rencontres may be in our own country, in foreign lands their inconvenience is materially diminished by the valuable information they convey. There are some chapters in human life, some phases in human eharacter, that are not to be learned in Grosvenor-square or the Rue de la Paix, and we would rather acquire their theory in a stage-coach, than go to St. Giles's or the Fauxbourg St. Antoine in quest of reality.

Englishmen are, after all, we guess, the least tolerant of travellers, and the most easily irritated by those little inconveniences and perversenesses with which the only way of dealing is, to meet them with a smile, and dismiss them with a jest. We cannot always have cushions and a travellingcarriage, cringing landlords and servile waiters, patent springs and M.Adamised roads, down beds and blood-horses. But we can always carry with us the recollection that these are but the luxuries of life; that they are at once the enjoyment and the scourge of the voluptuary; that although great hardships are injurious, minor ones are invigorating; that in some climates, a curtained couch is less refreshing than the bivouac ; and that the sensualist to whom Turkey carpets and elastic Ottomans are become necessaries of existence, goes out of his proper circle when he seeks the wild magnificence of Alpine scenery, the luxuriant beauty of cultivated nature, and the various aspects of society in foreign climes. But now for M. Montulé, and his Voyage en Angleterre.

a

a

in

i Perhaps,' he remarks, there is no country of which such different descriptions have been given. Jealousy or enthusiasm has. dictated almost every page that has been written respecting England. I now perfectly understand the exaggeration, favourable or otherwise, that I have remarked in a multitude of works; the French in particular, in consequence of their nearly incessant hostility with England, have rarely been able to judge of its inhabitants with impartiality. This country is so far advanced in civilization, that, as character or opinion sways, it will be regarded and estimated in a manner essentially different,

• When a man has always lived amid French disorder, confusion, I might alnıost say, negligence; and when he still retains the love of order and cleanliness, he must be filled with admiration in this country, where every thing is arranged in prescribed regularity, where nature itself seems to be adorned in its purest and freshest colours. For myself, I should be exclusively enchanted with England, it I had not previously seen Germany and the United States.

* Imagine, in the cities, the utmost regard to cleanliness, and the best possible taste in the set-out' of the shops; inns where every thing is ready, and every thing is good (!) The landlord complaisantly opens the door of the coach, presents his arm to assist you getting out; the waiters endeavour to read your wants in your looks, and all these persons are so well dressed, that you feel yourself the more gratified by their obliging servility. Represent to yourself, if possible, roads not so wide as ours, not paved, nor adorned by regu. lar ranges of trees, but winding easily in a country of shaded hills, of cultivated valleys, of bright-green turf; roads without ruts, gravelled like garden-walks, bordered by a causeway; add to this, a precocious verdure, cottages where the agreeable embellishes the useful, mansions in which every thing is made to yield to elegance and to perspective effect. All this passes rapidly before your eyes, for the diligences are not, as in France, slowly and laboriously dragged through the successive stages. The horses go over their ground at a swift and steady pace; the coachman's whip, always hanging over them, is seldom applied in a more serious manner. All this gives you but a faint idea of the mode of travelling in this country, and of the rich aspect which it presents.

• My admiration for our rival had been nearly arrested at a very early period of its excitement. When we stopped at Rochester to dinner, I asked for some water to wash. A handsome and elegant, chambermaid shewed me into a chamber on the first floor, and after bringing the necessary apparatus, approached me and held out her hand. I confess that I at first interpreted this gesture in too favourable a maoner ; but it soon appeared that she was only asking me for a gratuity, from this time I discovered that in England the slightest service is rated at a shilling, or at least at sixpence.

At ten o'clock we were in the suburbs of London. Every thing seemed illuminated; hydrogen gas shone from both sides of the streets in elegant lamps, and gushed in large flames in an infinity of shops.

M. de Montulé admits the superiority of London in the competition with Paris. The Parisian, from his characteristic urbanity, will appear as an individual to have greatly the advantage over the London citizen ; but when the general aspect of the two cities in point of civilisation is compared, Paris cannot sustain the trial. The contrasts and approximations of that capital are strikingly unfavourable.

• Splendid monuments, palaces close to the neglected habitations of misery, displease the eye. In London, order, regularity, the width of the streets, a general bustle among a population of respectable appearance, all is in harmony: you are satisfied with all. The Frenchman dislikes the restraint of neatness, but he is gratified with it when it comes in his way; and London, in this point of view, excites his admiration.'

Our Author excepts, however, the city, and the neighbourhood of the Doks, and is shrewd enough to find out that commerce will always be confined to the eastern parts of the great capital, because ships cannot pass London Bridge. His admiration is unbounded at the splendid establishments, dans l'Ouest, of the principal merchants, and he expatiates with much satisfaction, on the powder, silk stockings, and well-blacked shoes of their servants. He is mightily puzzled with the difference in this respect, that is to be found in their · Countings,' and appears to be amazingly scandalized, that in a land of liberty' a merchant's valet should be better dressed than his clerk. Liberty seems to have about as much to do with the matter as • heaven and earth' with the Frenchman's torn nether garments; but, if the goddess be at all concerned, it is in favour of the clerk, who dresses to please himself, while the lacquey figures in the livery of his master.

M. de Montulé sneers at the common phrase "shewing the lions, as a spirituelle enigme. The fact is, that he does not understand the joke, and as we can have no doubt of his being araong our continental readers, we shall punish bim for his sarcasm by leaving him in his ignorance. The parks—he cannot comprehend how a park can be a lion-delight him; and he talks very rationally on the subject of that piquant assemblage of oddities, uglinesses, common-places, and beauties, Regent Street.

• I cannot,' he says, describe its effect; it satisfied me; I am partial to novelties. The English study regularity in the Arts less than we do, but they display more boldness in their architecture, and build sometimes in a capricious style ; but they often produce striking combinations, and this street will be, not only the most extraordinary, but one of the finest in the world.'

He finds that soda-water is principally sold by the apothe

caries; and expresses his satisfaction at the quality and reasonable charge of a casual tavern dinner. A visit to Bedlam' draws from him an animated and amply merited eulogy on that admirably managed establishment. M. Montulé visited the Tower, and saw, pour de l'argent, all its curiosities; we feel ashamed of the miserable rapacity that levies so exorbitant a tax for so paltry an exhibition. The whole cannot be seen by a single person for less than six or seven shillings! We cannot agree with M. Montulé in his criticism on the colonnade which surrounds the tambour of the dome of St. Paul's. To our apprehension, its effect is admirable, and we should be more disposed to censure the heavy and naked stylobate on which it rests. We quite coincide with him in his dislike of the tasteless tourelles' which flank the pediment; we would, moreover, without ceremony or delay, cashier the balustrade, which Sir Christopher was compelled to add, against his better judge

ment.

In the House of Commons, the Speaker in his wig reminds our Traveller of the Malade imaginaire, and he mistakes the Mace for the King's Sceptre. Towards the close of the volume, we have a sketch of our constitutional history, and of our juridical system, from which we learn that when the Grand Jury has found a true bill, the Petit Jury is obliged to bring in a verdict of condemnation.

Bath reminds M. Montulé of Genoa, with the trifling difference, that it has a running stream instead of a noble bay. On his approach to Birmingham, he discovers that it presents an admirable aspect.' He gets into a worse humour with the English as he whirls along, and before he reaches the 'great workshop of the world,' he finds out that our rabbits, quite conscious that they are under the guardianship of the law, are perfectly free from their natural timidity. His description of the country about Dudley is brief but good, and reminds us of our own surprise and gratification when we first traversed that singular scenery, the Campi Phlegrai of England. At Liverpool, he finds out, that though the English are a thinking people, they think about little things and about their own interests; he forgives us, however, in consideration of Newton, Addison, Shakspeare, and Pope.

I shall state a circumstance which may serve to illustrate the calculating habits of the English, in contrast with those of mere routine by which we are distinguished. I had seen near the PontNeuf, at Paris, a very ingenious steam-engine, constructed for the purpose of removing the mud from rivers and harbours......... In all that I heard from the spectators, there was nothing in favour of this

truly useful invention; a few sarcasms and witticisms, and nothing more. I found the same machine at Liverpool, where it was just brought into use An immense crowd was examining it with attention; every one congratulated the author of so precious a discovery; a few individuals modestly suggested probable improvements. There is France and England.'

Manchester is hastily dismissed, but not without a becoming expression of indignation at our home slave system which sacrifices the health and happiness of multitudes of unhappy children to the demon of gain. On the road to Carlisle, he witnesses a boxing-match, and he seems rather inclined to patronise that humane and salutary custom. Scotland seems much to his taste. The situation and architecture of the • Modern Athens,' draw from him the admission that the first is the most agreeable' in the world, the second in the best 'taste.' He had found the English cold and reserved; he finds the Scotch gay and chatty-children playing,'' dogs running about,' and wisdom in abundance.

After Edimbourg comes Glasgow with its commercial noblesse;' then Wallace and Miss Porter, Dumbarton and the Clyde, Greenhok the port of Glaskow,' Inverary and the Duke of Argyle, all hurried over with a rapidity that, if generally adopted, would make the getting up of travels' a very easy species of manufacture.

We shall not attend M. de Montulé through his harlequinade to Staffa and through Ireland to the Giant's Causeway. His movements are too rapid to allow room for much description, and a simple itinerary would have answered the purpose nearly as well. He finds time, however, to invent a marvellous theory of basaltic formation, and to sneer at the confortable of a breakfast-table in the north of Ireland, because it only presented eggs, roast beef and mutton, butter, and tea: nothing of all this would satisfy our traveller, and he negotiated with great spirit and firmness for a glass of wisky.' He returns to England, quarrels with Sunday because the people walk slowly and the theatres are shut; gives no less than three pages and a quarter to admiration and description of Portsmouth with its arsenal; and reaches London in time for the Coronation. The events of that day convince him that English liberty is the shadow of a shade,' since a lord's coachman cut at some of the mob with his whip, and the cuirassiers paid no, attention when the populace shouted Queen, Queen.'

The volume which relates to Russia, we shall dismiss without comment, both because we have recently given an article on that country, and because M. Montulé's is not precisely the