12 Traveling Particularities. [JAN. 



English magazinesand reviews, viz. the Quarterly, Monthly Magazine, and 

 the New Monthly. The most frequented of the reading-rooms is that at the 

 bookseller's (I forget his name) in the rue Royale, at whose house our 

 celebrated countryman, Brummel, is domiciliated. The other is at a 

 boarding-house lately established in the rue du Soleil. At each you pay 

 six francs a month, or half a franc by the single day. The boarding-house 

 I have just mentioned is a great convenience to Calais. It is frequented 

 by some of the most reputable of the English, who are treated with com- 

 fort and respectability for about a guinea a week. Another convenience, 

 of a similar kind, has just been supplied to the inhabitants of Calais, in 

 the form of a tolerable restaurant, where you may dine, &c. a la carte, 

 or at so much per head. Until this and the boarding-house were esta- 

 blished, the " single gentlemen" of Calais, both native and foreign, were 

 sorely put to it to procure a decent dinner, &c., for a moderate price ; 

 for to get any such thing managed for you in a private house is utterly 

 inconsistent with French habits ; and there was no alternative but dining 

 at one or other of the rather expensive table d'hotes at the different hotels, 

 or going without an expedient which, I believe, not a few were in the 

 habit of adopting. Now, however, to " live like a gentleman," as the 

 phrase is understood in Ireland, comes within the means and the inclina- 

 tion even of an Irish half-pay captain ; that is to say, you may lodge in 

 comfort for twenty francs a month, breakfast for fifteen sous, dine (off 

 " soupe, trois plats, dessert, pain a discretion, une bouteille de vin, and 

 idem de bierre !") for two francs ; and pass the rest of the day in " the 

 best society of the place," for the price of a demi-tasse or a petit verre. 

 Accordingly, since the above arrangements have been completed, Calais 

 has begun to enjoy the patronage and protection of the class of persons 

 just named ; and, if it should continue to increase in favour with them as 

 it has done of late, Bath and Cheltenham may soon have to rejoice in what 

 most of their visitors will consider a very happy deliverance. 



Though the numerous religious ceremonies, processions, fetes, &c. 

 that take place in a French town may fairly enough be reckoned among 

 its amusements, both in their object and their effect ; yet, as they are 

 common to all towns, and for the most part coincident with each other, 

 I must not let them form part of an account which is intended to notice 

 peculiarities chiefly. It only remains, therefore, to mention the fair of 

 Calais, w r hich is held twice every year, and lasts nine or ten days each 

 time. There is no better policy in rulers than that of letting the inha- 

 bitants of every considerable town have a period of this kind always 

 before them to look forward to, and never a too distant one ; which twelve 

 months is. That which is not to happen till twelve months hence might 

 almost as well not happen at all, whether it be for good or for evil. The 

 French manage to be never without a fete or a fair in their heads, 

 because they never have too long a period to look forward to without 

 one. Nevertheless, with all their liveliness and love of amusement, a 

 French fair is not so lively and amusing a thing as an English one, either 

 to those who take part in it, or to a mere spectator. That of Greenwich, 

 on Easter Monday, is as much superior to its French pendant that of 

 Saint Cloud, on the Fete of St. Louis as the scene is at which it is held. 

 If the English are somewhat too serious and business-like in their mode 

 of taking their amusements, the French are as much too genteel. " Les 

 regies" must, on no account, be overstepped, even in the regions of mere 

 fun and farcing. Any couple who should take it into their heads (or 



