Tour D'Aigues 209 



melancholy spectacle is left. The baron is an enormous sufferer 

 by the revolution ; a great extent of country, which belonged in 

 absolute right to his ancestors, has been granted for quit rents, 

 cens, and other feudal payments, so that there is no comparison 

 between the lands retained and those thus granted by his family. 

 The loss of the droits honorifiques is much more than has been 

 apparent, and is an utter loss of all influence ; it was natural to 

 look for some plain and simple mode of compensation ; but the 

 declaration of the National Assembly allows none; and it is 

 feelingly known in this chateau that the solid payments which 

 the Assembly have declared to be rachetable are every hour 

 falhng to nothing, without a shadow of recompense. The 

 people are in arms, and at this moment very unquiet. The 

 situation of the nobility in this country is pitiable; they are 

 under apprehensions that nothing will be left them, but simply 

 such houses as the mob allows to stand unburnt; that the 

 metayers will retain their farms without pacing the landlord his 

 half of the produce ; and that, in case of such a refusal, there is 

 actually neither law nor authority in the country to prevent it. 

 Here is, however, in this house, a large and an agreeable society, 

 and cheerful to a miracle, considering the times, and what such 

 a great baron is losing, who has inherited from his ancestors 

 immense possessions, now frittering to nothing by the revolu- 

 tion. This chateau, splendid even in ruins, the venerable woods, 

 park, and all the ensigns of family and command, with the fortune 

 and even the lives of the owners at the mercy, and trampled on 

 by an armed rabble. What a spectacle ! The baron has a very 

 fine and well filled library, and one part of it totally with books 

 and tracts on agriculture, in all the languages of Europe. His 

 collection of these is nearly as numerous as my own. — 20 miles. 

 2nd. Monsieur Le President dedicated this day for an excur- 

 sion to his mountain-farm, five miles off, where he has a great 

 range, and one of the finest lakes in Provence, two thousand 

 toises round and forty feet deep. Directly from it rises a fine 

 mountain, consisting of a mass of shell agglutinated into stone; 

 it is a pity this hill is not planted, as the water wants the im- 

 mediate accompaniment of wood. Carp rise to 25 lb. and eels 

 to 12 lb. (Note, there are carp in the lake Bourgeat, in Savoy, 

 of 60 lb.) A neighbouring gentleman, Monsieur Jouvent, well 

 acquainted with the agriculture of this country, accompanied us, 

 and spent the rest of the day at the castle. I had much valu- 

 able information from the Baron de Tour d'Aigues, this gentle- 

 man, and from Monsieur I'Abbe de , I forget his name. In 



