28o TRAVELS THROUGH 



Before I quit this article, I muft obferve 

 that Madame de la Place did me the favour 

 of (hewing me the improvements (he had 

 made in her poultry yard -, (he had chofen 

 a very wild and romantic place on the river, 

 where, under the natural (hade of a pro- 

 jecting rock, covered with wood, (he had 

 built a fmall cottage, in the moft exquifite 

 tafte I eyer beheld any thing : the walls 

 were compofed of the trunks of trees, and 

 their crooked arms entwined in one another ; 

 the windows were partitions in various 

 forms, that happened to be furrounded by 

 branches, the effect much beyonc} any thing 

 in the Gothic ftile : it was thatched with 

 reeds and broad leaves j the chimney was 

 hid by being carried into a cleft of the rock, 

 fo that the fmoak came out above half a 

 mile off. In this cottage a woman lived, 

 \vho had the care of the poultry ; (he had 

 herfelf aTroom at the end of it, from which 

 fhe entered a kind of recefs open to the 

 river ; from tjie feats in this, you look at 

 once upon a moft tremenduoqs rock on the 

 other fide the river, part of its crags bare, 

 and part thickly covered with brufh wood ; 

 pa each fide a hanging wood, on fo perpeiir 



^icular 



