192 Travels in France 



product of the lands? What liad such inquiries to do with 

 springs and volcanoes ? I told them that, cultivating some land 

 in England, rendered such things interesting to me personally: 

 and lastly that, if they would send to Clermont, they might 

 know, from several respectable persons, the truth of all I asserted, 

 and therefore I hoped, as it was the woman's first indiscretion, 

 for I could not call it offence, they would dismiss her. This was 

 refused at first, but assented to at last, on my declaring that if 

 they imprisoned her, they should do the same by me, and 

 answer it as the}- could. They consented to let her go with a 

 reprim.and, and I departed ; not marvelling, for I have done with 

 that, at their ignorance, in imagining that the queen should 

 conspire so dangerously against their rocks and mountains. I 

 found my guide in the midst of the mob who had been very 

 busy in putting as many questions about me as I had done 

 about their crops. — There were two opinions, one party thought 

 I was a commissaire, come to ascertain the damage done by the 

 hail: the other, that I was an agent of the queen's, who intended 

 to blow the town up with a mine and send all that escaped to 

 the galleys. The care that must have been taken to render the 

 character of that princess detested among the people is in- 

 credible, and there seems everywhere to be no absurdities too 

 gross, nor circumstances too impossible for their faith. In the 

 evening to the theatre, the Optimist well acted. Before I leave 

 Clermont, I must remark that I dined, or supped, five times at 

 the table d'hote, with from twenty to thirty merchants and 

 tradesmen, officers, etc. : and it is not easy for me to express the 

 insignificance, the inanity of the conversation. Scarcely any 

 politics, at a moment when every bosom ought to beat with 

 none but political sensations. The ignorance or the stupidity 

 of these people must be absolutely incredible; not a week passes 

 without their country abounding with events that are analysed 

 and debated by the carpenters and blacksmiths of England. 

 The abolition of tithes, the destruction of the gabelle, game made 

 property, and feudal rights destroyed, are French topics that 

 are translated into English within six daj-s after they happen, 

 and their consequences, combinations, results, and modifica- 

 tions become the disquisition and entertainment of the grocers, 

 chandlers, drapers, and shoemakers of all the towns of England; 

 yet the same people in France do not think them worth their 

 conversation, except in private. Wh}-.? because conversation 

 in private wants little knowledge, but in public it demands 

 more, and therefore I suppose, for I confess there are a thousand 



