Observations and Reflections Made in the Course of a Journey through France, Italy, and Germany, Vo | Page 2

Public, whose treatment of me
deserves every possible acknowledgment; and more than those
acknowledgments will I not add--to a work, which, such as it is, I
submit to their candour, resolving to think as little of the event as I can
help; for the labours of the press resemble those of the toilette, both
should be attended to, and finished with care; but once complete,
should take up no more of our attention; unless we are disposed at
evening to destroy all effect of our morning's study.

OBSERVATIONS AND REFLECTIONS
MADE IN A JOURNEY THROUGH
France, Italy, and Germany.
* * * * *

FRANCE.

CALAIS.
September 7, 1784.
Of all pleasure, I see much may be destroyed by eagerness of
anticipation: I had told my female companion, to whom travelling was
new, how she would be surprized and astonished, at the difference
found in crossing the narrow sea from England to France, and now she

is not astonished at all; why should she? We have lingered and loitered
six and twenty hours from port to port, while sickness and fatigue made
her feel as if much more time still had elapsed since she quitted the
opposite shore. The truth is, we wanted wind exceedingly; and the
flights of shaggs, and shoals of maycril, both beautiful enough, and
both uncommon too at this season, made us very little amends for the
tediousness of a night passed on ship-board.
Seeing the sun rise and set, however, upon an unobstructed horizon,
was a new idea gained to me, who never till now had the opportunity. It
confirmed the truth of that maxim which tells us, that the human mind
must have something left to supply for itself on the sight of all
sublunary objects. When my eyes have watched the rising or setting
sun through a thick crowd of intervening trees, or seen it sink gradually
behind a hill which obstructed my closer observation, fancy has always
painted the full view finer than at last I found it; and if the sun itself
cannot satisfy the cravings of a thirsty imagination, let it at least
convince us that nothing on this side Heaven can satisfy them, and set
our affections accordingly.
Pious reflections remind one of monks and nuns; I enquired of the
Franciscan friar who attended us at the inn, what was become of Father
Felix, who did the duties of the quête; as it is called, about a dozen
years ago, when I recollect minding that his manners and story struck
Dr. Johnson exceedingly, who said that so complete a character could
scarcely be found in romance. He had been a soldier, it seems, and was
no incompetent or mean scholar: the books we found open in his cell,
shewed he had not neglected modern or colloquial knowledge; there
was a translation of Addison's Spectators, and Rapin's Dissertation on
the contending Parties of England called Whig and Tory. He had
likewise a violin, and some printed music, for his entertainment. I was
glad to hear he was well, and travelling to Barcelona on foot by orders
of the superior.
After dinner we set out to see Miss Grey, at her convent of Dominican
Nuns; who, I hoped, would have remembered me, as many of the ladies
there had seized much of my attention when last abroad; they had

however all forgotten me, nor could call to mind how much they had
once admired the beauty of my eldest daughter, then a child, which I
thought impossible to forget: one is always more important in one's
own eyes than in those of others; but no one is of importance to a Nun,
who is and ought to be employed in other speculations.
When the Great Mogul showed his splendour to a travelling dervise,
who expressed his little admiration of it--"Shall you not often be
thinking of me in future?" said the monarch. "Perhaps I might," replied
the religieux, "if I were not always thinking upon God."
The women spinning at their doors here, or making lace, or employing
themselves in some manner, is particularly consolatory to a British eye;
yet I do not recollect it struck me last time I was over: industry without
bustle, and some appearance of gain without fraud, comfort one's heart;
while all the profits of commerce scarcely can be said to make
immediate compensation to a delicate mind, for the noise and brutality
observed in an English port. I looked again for the chapel, where the
model of a ship, elegantly constructed, hung from the top, and found it
in good preservation: some scrupulous man had made the ship, it seems,
and thought, perhaps justly too, that he had spent a greater portion of
time and care on the workmanship than he ought to have