true monopolizing ideas; they would involve four-andtwenty millions of people in the certain miseries of a war, rather than see the interest of those who consume fabrics, preferred to the interest of those who make them. The advantages reaped by four-and-twenty millions of consumers are lighter than a feather compared with the inconveniences sustained by half a million of manufacturers. Meet many small carts in the town, drawn each by a dog: I was told by the owner of one, what appears to me incredible, that his dog would draw 700lb. half a league. The wheels of these carts are very high, relative to the height of the dog, so that his chest is a good deal below the axle.

The 6th. In leaving Lisle, the reparation of a bridge made me take a road on the banks of the canal, close under the works of the citadel. They appear to be very numerous, and the situation exceedingly advantageous, on a gently rising ground, surrounded by low watry meadows, which may with ease be drowned. Pass Darmentiers, a large paved town. Sleep at Mont. Cassel.230 miles.

The 7th. Cassel is on the summit of the only hill in Flanders. They are now repairing the bason at Dunkirk,3 so famous in history for an imperiousness in England, which she must have paid dearly for. Dunkirk, Gibraltar, and the statue of Louis XIV. in the Place de Victoire, I place in the same political class of national arrogance. Many men are now at work on this bason, and, when finished, it will not contain more than twenty or twentyfive frigates; and appears to an unlearned eye, a ridiculous object for the jealousy of a great nation, unless it professes to be jealous of privateers.-I made enquiries concerning the import of wool from England, and was assured that it was a very trifling object. I may here observe, that when I left the town, my little cloak-bag was examined as scrupulously as if I had just left England, with a cargo of prohibited goods, and again at a fort two miles of Dunkirk being a free port, the custom-house is at the gates. 1 D'armentières or Armentières (Nord). 2 Cassel on the Mont Cassel (Nord). 3 (Nord.)

What are we to think of our woollen manufacturers in England, when suing for their wool-bill, of infamous memory, bringing one Thomas Wilkinson from Dunkirk quay, to the bar of the English House of Lords to swear that wool passes from Dunkirk without entry, duty, or any thing being required, at double custom-houses, for a check on each other, where they examine even a cloak-bag. On such evidence, did our legislature, in the true shop-keeping spirit, pass an act of fines, pains, and penalties against all the wool-growers of England. Walk to Rossendal1 near the town, where Mons. le Brun has an inprovement on the Dunes, which he very obligingly shewed me. Between the

town and that place are a great number of neat little houses, built with each its garden, and one or two fields inclosed of most wretched blowing dune sand, naturally as white as snow, but improved by industry. The magic of PROPERTY turns sand to gold-18 miles.

2

The 8th. Leave Dunkirk, where the Concierge, a good inn, as indeed I have found all in Flanders. Pass Gravelline, which, to my unlearned eyes, seems the strongest place I have yet seen, at least the works above ground are more numerous than at any other. Ditches, ramparts, and drawbridges without end. This is a part of the art military I like it implies defence, and leaving rascality to neighbours. If Gengischan or Tamerlane had met with such places as Gravelline or Lisle in their way, where would their conquests and extirpations of the human race have been?-Reach Calais. And here ends a journey which has given me a great deal of pleasure, and more information than I should have expected in a kingdom not so well cultivated as our own. It has been the first of my foreign travels; and has with me confirmed the idea, that to know our own country well, we must see something of others., Nations figure by comparison; and those ought to be esteemed the benefactors of the human race, who have most established public prosperity on the basis of private happiness. To ascertain how far this has been the case with the French, has been one material object of my tour. It is an enquiry of great range, and no trifling complexity; but a

single excursion is too little to trust to. I must come again and again before I venture conclusions.-25 miles.

Wait at Desseins three days for a wind (the duke and dutchess of Gloucester are in the same inn and situation) and for a pacquet. A captain behaved shabbilly: deceived me, and was hired by a family that would admit nobody but themselves:-I did not ask what nation this family was of.-Dover-London-Bradfield;—and have more pleasure in giving my little girl a French doll, than in viewing Versailles.

1788.

THE 'HE long journey I had last year taken in France, suggested a variety of reflections on the agriculture, and on the sources and progress of national prosperity in that kingdom; in spite of myself, these ideas fermented in my mind; and while I was drawing conclusions relative to the political state of that great country, in every circumstance connected with its husbandry. I found, at each moment of my reflection, the importance of making as regular a survey of the whole as was possible for a traveller to effect. Thus instigated, I determined to attempt finishing what I had fortunately enough begun.

JULY 30. Left Bradfield; and arrived at Calais.-161 miles.

AUGUST 5. The next day I took the road to St. Omers.1 Pass the bridge Sans Pareil, which serves a double purpose, passing two streams at once; but it has been praised beyond its merit, and cost more than it was worth. St. Omers contains little deserving notice; and if I could direct the legislatures of England and Ireland, should contain still less-why are catholics to emigrate in order to be ill educated abroad, instead of being allowed institutions that would educate them well at home? The country is seen to advantage from St. Bertin's steeple.--25 miles.

The 7th. The canal of St. Omers is carried up a hill by a series of sluices. To Aire,2 and Lilliers,3 and Bethune,* towns well known in military story.-25 miles.

5

The 8th. The country now a champaign, one changes; from Bethune to Arras an admirable gravel road. At the last town there is nothing but the great and rich abbey of Var, which they would not shew me--it was not the right day or some frivolous excuse. The cathedral is nothing. -17 miles.

6

1 (Pas de Calais.)

3 Lillers (Pas de Calais).

5 Arras (Pas de Calais).

2 Aire-sur-la-Lys (Pas de Calais).

4 Béthune (Pas de Calais).

6 Ancient Benedictine abbey of St. Vaast, now appropriated to the bishop's palace, seminary, museum, and public library.

The 9th. Market-day; coming out of the town I met at least an hundred asses, some loaded with a bag, others a sack, but all apparently with a trifling burthen, and swarms of men and women. This is called a market, being plentifully supplied; but a great proportion of all the labour of a country is idle in the midst of harvest, to supply a town which in England would be fed by of the people: whenever this swarm of triflers buz in a market, I take a minute and vicious division of the soil for granted. Here my only companion de voyage, the English mare that carries me, discloses by her eye a secret not the most agreeable, that she is going rapidly blind. She is mooneyed; but our fool of a Bury farrier assured me I was safe for above a twelvemonth. It must be confessed this is one of those agreeable situations which not many will believe a man would put himself into. Ma foy! this is a piece of my good luck ;—the journey at best is but a drudgery, that others are paid for performing on a good horse, and I pay myself for doing it on a blind one;-I shall feel this inconvenience perhaps at the expence of my neck.-20 miles.

The 10th. To Amiens.' Mr. Fox slept here last night, and it was amusing to hear the conversation at the table d'hôte; they wondered that so great a man should not travel in a greater style :-I asked what was his style? Monsieur and Madame were in an English post-chaise, and the fille and valet de chambre in a cabriolet, with a French courier to have horses ready. What would they have? but a style both of comfort and amusement? A plague on a blind mare!-But I have worked through life; and he

TALKS.

2

3

The 11th. By Poix to Aumale; ' enter Normandy.— 25 miles.

4

The 12th. From thence to Newchatel, by far the finest country since Calais. Pass many villas of Rouen merchants.-40 miles.

1 (Somme.)

Passed on the railway from Rouen to Amiens (Seine Inférieure).

3 Aumale, the ancient Albemarle (Seine Inférieure). 4 Neufchâtel, anciently a fortress (Seine Inférieure).