STUDY XIII, 127 



and Is, in propriety of fpeech, the centre of it's 

 commerce in Europe. Of thefe are very few but 

 what every day witneffes tranfa6lions to the amount 

 of millions. Mod of the good people who there 

 affemble are drtiied in brown, and without ruffles. 

 This contraft appeared to me fo much the more 

 ilriking, that only five days before, 1 happened to 

 be upon the Palais Royal at Paris, at the fame hour 

 of the day, which was then crowded with people 

 dreffed in brilliant colours, vnûi gold and filver laces, 

 and prating about nothings, the opera, literature, 

 kept miflreffes, and fuch contemptible trifles, and 

 who had not, the greateft part of them at leaft, a 

 fmgle crown in their pocket which they could call 

 their own. 



We had with us a young tradefman of Nantes, 

 whofe affairs had been unfortunately deranged, and 

 who had come to feek an afylum in Holland, 

 where he did not know a fingle perfon. He dif- 

 clofed his fituation to my travelling companion, a 

 gentleman of the name of Le Breton. This Mr. 

 Le Breton was a Swifs officer, in the Dutch fervice, 

 half foldier, half merchant, one of the beft men 

 living, who fiift gave him encouragement, and re- 

 commended him, immediately on his arrival, to 

 his own elder brother, a refpeftable trader, who 

 boarded in the fame houfe where we had fixed. 

 Mr. Le Breton the elder carried this unfortunate 



refugee 



