9° General History of Bath. 



THE NINETEENTH CENTURY, 

 With Notes on the Present Condition of Bath. 



The history of our city in the present century is not quite 

 a continuation of the story of the eighteenth. The peace 

 of 1 815 removed the hitherto unsurmountable barrier to 

 foreign travel, and many who had been before contented 

 with the beauties of their own country rushed eagerly to the 

 scenery and amusements of the Continent. 



If Bath had enjoyed no other claim to recognition than 

 that of a place suited to kill some idle weeks, its prosperity 

 would indeed have been once more in danger. But even 

 before the tide of visitors began to ebb, there had been an 

 internal movement towards the ^establishment of the city on 

 a broader basis. 



Brilliant, meteor-like, as was the career of the city during 

 the eighteenth century, we cannot help being struck with a 

 feeling of unreality. The idea of many hundreds of gaily- 

 dressed ladies and gentlemen sauntering through life, bath- 

 ing, promenading, and dancing within the city, and forming 

 themselves into Watteau-like groups on the slope of the hills, 

 and all under the paternal despotism of an Arbiter Eleganti- 

 arum, is not one which we can connect with stability. 



Already it had become apparent that the artificial high 

 pressure could not be indefinitely sustained ; and there had 

 grown up an opposition to that concentration of all amuse- 

 ments and occupations into one small focus, which had 

 been the ruling principle of management. 



