1828.] Dunkerque. 159 



nearer to the exquisite Brunet, than any I have seen. Dumas is a close 

 imitator of an actor who has not a single fault to imitate : so that he has 

 an advantage which most imitators are without the faults of their 

 original being, in the eyes of imitators, their only beauties. 



Judging from the cafes and restaurants (no bad criterions), the people 

 of Dunkerque are singularly domesticated in their habits. For a popu- 

 lation of more than twenty thousand, there is but one of the latter esta- 

 blishments, and of the former only three or four that are at all comrne il 

 faut ; and these are not frequented as the like places are in most of the 

 provincial towns of France to say nothing of Paris itself. The reason 

 may perhaps be, that they are not conducted with the same degree of 

 spirit and eclat that the French usually bestow upon such matters. In 

 Paris, and the first-rate provincial towns, the cafe is the Frenchman's 

 home ; but this is because he finds there all sorts of attractions and 

 agremens, which, necessary as they are to his existence, he seldom thinks 

 of connecting with his home, even when he has the means. But in 

 Dunkerque, though it is one of the most flourishing among the second or 

 third rate French towns, money is a scarce commodity, even as compared 

 with other similar portions of the kingdom ; and there is no one who 

 better understands the true value of money than a Frenchman. In Paris 

 he is dissipated, and lives in cafes and out of doors, because it costs him 

 no more to do so than it does to be steady and domestic at home : in 

 Dunkerque he contrives to make himself happy in the latter character, 

 because to go out of it is inconsistent with his calculations as to the rela- 

 tive value of any given number of sous, and the entertainment that may 

 be purchased for them. He cannot, any where, do without his cup of 

 cafe noir and his petit verre after dinner ; but here he cannot persuade 

 himself to pay ten sous for them abroad, when he can have them for 

 three at home. The same causes which tend to make a community fond 

 of theatrical amusements, tend equally to make them religious or, I 

 should rather say, fond of religious ceremonies. Accordingly, those of the 

 Dunkerquois, who are not theatrical, are devote, and many are both one 

 and the other. The consequence is, that the demand for religious cere- 

 monies is greater here than in most other French towns, and the supply 

 is in proportion. The most imposing of all the ordinary religious cere- 

 monies of the French church is at the same time the most common I 

 mean the military mass that is held every Sunday at noon in all the gar- 

 rison towns. Perhaps, among the feelings called forth by the various 

 artificial sights and sounds, united, that have been invented by human 

 ingenuity with a view to the excitement of the human passions and affec- 

 tions, there is no one so new, and so striking in its immediate effects, as 

 that which results from the first striking up of a full military band 

 within the walls of a great cathedral filled with religious worshippers. 

 The instantaneous change, without any apparent warning or signal, from 

 profound silence to the mad rattle of drums, the clashing of cymbals, the 

 blare of trumpets, and the shrill and piercing cry of fifes : the charac- 

 teristic effect of each class of these instruments heightened tenfold by the 

 resounding roof and echoing walls of the place in which they are heard ; 

 the effect of this upon a Protestant ear, not prepared for it beforehand, 

 is perfectly indescribable. Military mass is performed every Sunday in 

 the cathedral church of Saint Eloi, at Dunkerque. At noon, the bat- 

 talion that is stationed in the town marches in at the great centre-doors of 

 the church, drums beating, and the full band playing preceded by the 

 field officers, the authorities of the town, &c. ; and the whole take their 



