395] A Trip to Paris. [396 The sents but one large front; but it is square The Foundling Hospitul, which I in its construction; containing several had often heard mentioned as an institucourts with galleries, in which about tion more extensive than any other of the 3,000 inmates can be accommodated. kind, I did not find, as I expected, to be In every part of this hospital, a great a building upon a scale of extraordinary attention to fresh air and cleanliness is magnitude. It is near the Observatory evident. The bedrooms of the patients and the Boulevard du Parnasse. The has a thorough air from windows on whole institution is now placed under opposite sides, which look into small what they call la Maternité. gardens; and, though the weather had building just mentioned contained only for a long time been very hot, not the one hundred beds, or rather iron cradles, least offensive smell was perceived in in one large room, besides an infirmary any part of it. The bedsteads have for the sick infants; these cradles had white curtains, and a chest of drawers white coverings, and the room seemed by the side of them; the pewter basons to be sufficiently spacious for that numfor the soup were scoured by the nurses ber of infants under the age of two years; to the utmost degree of brightness. for, when arrived at that age, they are There are gardens for those who are sent to other houses, called Hospices des able to walk, and covered places to Orphelins. The hundred cradles in this shelter them from the rain or the sun. room were not now filled, by about thirty. In the captains' dining-room the cloth Whilst I was surprised at the small was laid for dinner; with a napkin, a number of these infants in the bouse, I large loaf, and a bottle of wine for each, was much more surprised, when I was. This room is adorned with paintings of told, that the number with the nurses, in the towns taken in 1672. In the soldiers' the country, amounted to fourteen thouroom the cloth was not yet laid; it had sund. Each infant, on being received, paintings of merely the plans of the has a ticket fastened to its cap with a fortifications taken in 1667. The great progressive number, beginning every new kitchen is high and cleanly, but appar- year with number one: the number of ently not very large for such an establish- this day (16th September) was 3,600 and ment. There is a separate kitchen for a few more. In the infirmary there were the apothecary. The chapel has nothing many infants; there was a fire and very particular; but the greatest attention several nurses. The woman attending and expense has been bestowed upon me uncovered and showed to me many that part which is under the dome, and pitiable-looking babies; at last coming upon the dome itself. The architecture to one cradle, she said: "I fear this poor of this part, in the form of a cross, is thing is dead." She uncovered it, and beautiful; the floor of the rotunda and sure enough it was dead, cold, and stiff, of the adjoining chapels is of marble, and its mouth covered with froth. The adorned with fleurs de lis. Here is a woman appeared quite indifferent about monument to Vauban, erected, as the it. Whilst the principal object of this inscription says, par S. M. l'Empereur institution seems to be, to prevent inet Roi, 1807:-another monument for fanticide, for which it is well calculated, Turenne, who is represented dying in I cannot help entertaining doubts of the the arms of victory, with the battle of expediency of carrying it to such extent, Turkheim in 1675, in bas relief. The as will invite the idle and profligate to interior of the cupola and the ceilings are adorned with beautiful paintings set in richly gilt frames. This hospital was originally erected by Louis XIV. While I was in this hospital, a large body of foreign troops, returning from exercise in the Champs de Mars, marched by with drums and music playing, and colours flying: what effect this must have upon the feeling of these veterans in their resily imagined. 397] A Trip to Paris. [398 inclosing a large square planted with trees, facility of speaking French, without which and a large chapel. The rooms are such controversies cannot be carried on airy and clean, and the utensils properly with proper spirit. In a company where scoured. The children appeared de- a portrait of Blücher was exhibited, a cently clean, though not like what you Frenchman exclaimed: "That man has are accustomed to in England. Their done us a deal of mischief!"-" But appearance was also healthy, considering consider, Sir, what misery the French the general complexion of French chil- had before inflicted on the Prussians!" dren. The girls make the linen for them--"Mais!" replied the Frenchman, selves and for the boys, when these are "apres avoir eu tant de tems a y resent out to employment. The nurses flechir !" seemed, by their dress, to belong to a religious order, and had a very respectable appearance. An old duchess observed: "We are told that the English and Prussians believe in the Gospel, (l'Evangile,) which Several of the hospitals bear the in- commands us to forgive our enemies."— scription: Hospice d'Incurables, which "Ah, Madam! the French armies have does not allude to lunatics, but to crip- published such a new version of this ples, superannuated, and sick past reco- sacred text, by their cannon and bayonets very A large hospital of this kind is in in other countries, that it were not to be the rue Recollet, formerly a monastery wondered at if the inhabitants of those of the Recollets. It is a fine large stone countries should in some degree be inbuilding, with an open ground along the fected by it."-"These are evasions," whole front, containing about five hun- said the duchess: respect forbade any dred patients. In this neighbourhood further reply. is also the large hospital of St. Louis, "Your English ministers," observed which is now said to be restricted to another Frenchman, "ought to erect on diseases of an eruptive nature; I was the highest mountain in Scotland a temtold that it contained at present about ple to the God of Frost and Snow, to twelve hundred patients. The lower whom they are indebted for their sucbedrooms were vaulted and white-washed, cess more than to their own abilities."— and contained three rows of beds each, Non nobis Domine! ought certainly to without curtains, and open to a thorough be sung with a most cordial feeling and air. A pretty large church is attached conviction on the present occasion by to it. The patients, who were walking the successful Allies; who, however great about, had a dirty appearance Val de the merit of their exertions to profit by Grace, another hospital, was formerly a the favourable crisis, will no doubt asnursery-a fine building, and one of the cribe all their success to the great Author ornamental objects in a view of Paris. of Nature, who alone could produce this There are in front of several houses in crisis; and if the French, on their side, Paris, inscriptions of Bureau de Benefi- would seek in the justice of that same cence, which evidently allude to a cha- Being the cause of their overthrow, it ritable institution, the nature of which would perhaps form the best basis of a I have not yet had explained to me. In cordial union among all the parties.one of the churches here you may still Some future historian will perhaps dissee a board, on which is inscribed a de- cover and trace a resemblance in the cree of the Emperor of the year 1805, features of the present times to those of whereby the churchwardens are autho- the Reformation. At that period reliized to make a collection for the poor, gious interests had, as political interests at eleven o'clock at high mass, on Sun- at the present day, long fermented in days only. the minds of men, producing a crisis by I have already had many political dis- which, as the physical body is affected putes with French politicians, and should by a fever, so the body politic becomes have had more, if a long suspension of violently convulsed. practice had not deprived me of that Concluded in our next. 399] Original Letters of Dr. Franklin. [400 PRIVATE CORRESPONDENCE OF DR. B. FRANKLIN, NOW FIRST PUBLISHED FROM THE ORIGINALS, BY HIS GRANDSON, WM. TEMPLE FRANKLIN. IN MR. EDITOR, From the New Monthly Magazine. my advice had been asked, have objected N turning over the volume of the to their wearing their ribband and badge Correspondence of Dr. Franklin, themselves, according to their fancy, just published by the grandson of that though I certainly should to the entailing eminent man, I was particularly struck it as an honour on their posterity. For, with a letter on the subject of the Amer- honour worthily obtained (as that for exican Order of Cincinnati, in which, with ample of our officers) is in its nature a much force and ingenuity, he argues the personal thing, and incommunicable to absurdity of hereditary honorary distinctions. I inclose a transcript of it, confident that its insertion in your pages will gratify such of your readers as are not yet in possession of the volume from which it is extracted. Heralds' College, Jan. 5, 1817. N. To Mrs. BACHE.* My dear Child, any but those who had some share in obtaining it. Thus among the Chinese, the most ancient, and from long experience the wisest of nations, honour does not descend, but ascends. If a man from his learning, his wisdom, or his valour, is promoted by the emperor to the rank of mandarin, his parents are immediately entitled to all the same ceremonies of re spect from the people, that are established as due to the mandarin himself; on the YOUR care in sending me the news- supposition that it must have been owing papers is very agreeable to me. I re- to the education, instruction, and good ceived by Captain Barney those relating example afforded him by his parents that to the Cincinnati. My opinion of the in- he was rendered capable of serving the stitution cannot be of much importance; public. This ascending honour is thereI only wonder that when the united wis- fore useful to the state, as it encourages dom of our nation had, in the articles of parents to give their children a good and confederation, manifested their dislike of virtuous education. But the descending establishing ranks of nobility, by author- honour, to a posterity who could have no ity either of the congress or of any par- share in obtaining it, is not only groundticular state, a number of private per- less and absurd, but often hurtful to that sons should think proper to distinguish posterity, since it is apt to make them themselves and their posterity, from their proud, disdaining to be employed in the fellow-citizens, and form an order of useful arts, and thence falling into por hereditary knights, in direct opposition erty, and all the meanness, servility, and to the solemnly declared sense of their wretchedness attending it; which is the country. I imagine it must be likewise present case with much of what is called contrary to the good sense of most of the noblesse in Europe. Or if, to keep those drawn into it, by the persuasion of up the dignity of the family, estates are its projectors, who have been too much entailed entire on the eldest male heir, struck with the ribbands and crosses another pest to industry and improvethey have seen hanging on the button- ment of the country is introduced, which holes of foreign officers. And I suppose will be followed by all the odious mixture those who disapprove of it have not hith- of pride and beggary and idleness that erto given it much opposition, from a have half depopulated and decultivated principle somewhat like that of your Spain; occasioning continual extinction good mother, relating to punctilious per- of families by the discouragements of sons who are always exacting little ob- marriage, and neglect in the improveservances of respect, that "if people can ment of estates. I wish, therefore, that be pleased with small matters, it is a pity the Cincinnati, if they must go on with but they should have them." In this their project, would direct the badges of view, perhaps, I should not myself, if their order to be worn by their fathers and mothers, instead of handing them down to their children. It would be a amer Dr. Franklin's only daughter, med to 401] Original Letters of Dr. Franklin. good precedent, and might have good effects. It would also be a kind of obedience to the fourth commandment, in which God enjoins us to honour our father and mother, but has no where directed us to honour our children. And certainly no mode of honouring those immediate authors of our being can be more effectual than that of doing praiseworthy actions which reflect honour on those who gave us our education; or more becoming than that of manifesting by some public expression or token, that it is to their instruction and example we ascribe the merit of those actions. But the absurdity of descending hon ours is not a mere matter of philosophical opinion, it is capable of mathematical demonstration. A man's son, for instance, is but half of his family, the other half belonging to the family of his wife, His son, too, marrying into another family, his share in the grandson is but a fourth; in the great-grandson by the same process it is but an eighth. In the next generation a sixteenth, the next a thirty-second, the next a sixty-fourth, the next a hundred and twenty-eight, the next a two hundred and fifty-sixth, and the next a five hundred and twelfth thus in nine generations, which will not require more than 300 years, (no very great antiquity for a family,) our present Chevalier of the Order of Cincinnatus's share in the then existing knight will be but a 512th part; which, allowing the present certain fidelity of American wives to be insured down through all those nine generations, is so small a consideration, that methinks no reasonable man would hazard for the sake of it, the disagreeable consequences of the jealousy, envy, and ill-will of his countrymen. [402 dred and twelve, who must be now existing, and all contribute their portion of this future Chevalier de Cincinnatus. These, with the rest, make together as follows: 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, 256, 512, Total, 1022. One thousand and twenty-two men and women, contributors to the formation of one knight. And if we are to have a thousand of these future knights, there must be now and hereafter existing one million and twenty-two thousand fathers and mothers, who are to contribute to their production, unless a part of the number are employed in making more knights than one. Let us strike off then the 22,000 on the supposition of this double employ, and then consider whether after a reasonable estimation of the number of rogues and fools and scoundrels and prostitutes that are mixed with, and help to make up necessarily their million of predecessors, posterity will have much reason to boast of the noble blood of the then existing set of Chevaliers of Cincinnatus. The future genealogists too of these Chevaliers, in proving the lineal descent of their honour through so many generations, (even supposing honour capable in its nature of descending) will only prove the small share of this honour which can be justly claimed by any one of them, since the above simple process in arithmetic makes it quite plain and clear, that in proportion as the antiquity of the family shall augment, the right to the honour of the ancestor will diminish; and a few generations more would reduce it to something so small as to be very near an absolute nullity. I hope, therefore, that the Order will drop this part of their Let us go back with our calculation project, and content themselves as the from this young noble, the 512th part of Knights of the Garter, Bath, Thistle, St. the present knight, through his nine gen- Louis, and other Orders of Europe do, erations, till we return to the year of the with a life enjoyment of their little badge institution. He must have had a father and ribband, and let the distinction die and a mother, they are two; each of with those who have merited it. them had a father and a mother, they I imagine, will give no offence. For my are four. Those of the next preceding own part, I shall think it a convenience generation will be eight, the next sixteen, when I go into a company where there the next thirty-two, the next sixty-four, may be faces unknown to me, if I diɛthe next one hundred and twenty-eight, cover, by this badge, the persons who the next two hundred and fifty-six, and merit some particular expression of my the ninth in this retrocession five hun- respect; and it will save modest virtue This, 403] Original Letters of Dr. Franklin. [404 the trouble of calling for our regard, by (though a little vain and silly 'tis true, awkward round-about intimations of but not the worse emblem for that) a having been heretofore employed as officers in the continental service. bird of courage, and would not hesitate to attack a grenadier of the British guards, who should presume to invade his farm-yard with a red coat on. The gentleman, who made the voyage to France to provide the ribbands and medals, has executed his commission. I shall not enter into the criticisms To me they seem tolerably done; but made upon their Latin. The gallant all such things are criticised. Some find officers of America may not have the fault with the Latin, as wanting classical merit of being great scholars, but they elegance and correctness; and since our undoubtedly merit much as brave solnine universities were not able to furnish diers from their country, which should better Latin, it was pity, they say, that therefore not leave them merely to fame the mottos had not been in English. for their virtutis premium, which is one Others object to the title, as not properly of their Latin mottos. Their esto perassumable by any but General Wash- petua, another, is an excellent wish, if ington, and a few others, who served they meant it for their country; bad, if without pay. Others object to the bald intended for their order. The states eagle, as looking too much like a dindon, should not only restore to them the or turkey. For my own part, I wish the omnia of their first motto,* which many bald eagle had not been chosen as the of them have left and lost, but pay them representative of our country; he is a justly and reward them generously. bird of bad moral character-he does They should not be suffered to remain not get his living honestly: you may with all their new-created chivalry enhave seen him perched on some dead tirely in the situation of the gentleman in tree, where, too lazy to fish for himself, the story, which their omnia reliquit rehe watches the labour of the fishing- minds me of. You know every thing hawk; and when that diligent bird has makes me recollect some story. He had at length taken a fish, and is bearing it built a very fine house, and thereby to his nest for the support of his mate much impaired his fortune. He had a and young ones, the bald eagle pursues pride however in shewing it to his achim, and takes it from him. With all quaintance. One of them, after viewing this injustice he is never in good case, it all, remarked a motto over the door, but, like those among men who live by OIA VANITAS. What, says he, is sharping and robbing, he is generally the meaning of this ŪIA? 'tis a word I poor, and often very lousy. Besides, he don't understand. I will tell you, said is a rank coward: the little king-bird, the gentleman: I had a mind to have not bigger than a sparrow, attacks him the motto cut on a piece of smooth marboldly, and drives him out of the district. ble, but there was not room enough for He is therefore by no means a proper it between the ornaments, to be put in emblem for the brave and honest Cincin- characters large enough to be read. I nati of America, who have driven all the therefore made use of a contraction anking birds from our country: though exciently very common in Latin manuactly fit for that order of knights which scripts, whereby the m's and n's in words the French call Chevaliers d'Industrie. are omitted, and the omission noted by I am on this account not displeased that a little dash above, which you may see the figure is not known as a bald eagle, there, so that the word is omnia-OMNIA but looks more like a turkey. For, in VANITAS. O, said his friend, I now truth, the turkey is, in comparison,a much comprehend the meaning of your motto, more respectable bird, and withal a true original native of America. Eagles have been, found in all countries, but the turkey was peculiar to ours; the first of the species seen in Europe being brought to France by the Jesuits from Canada, and served up at the wedding-tabl of * Omnia reliquit servare rempublicam. Charles the Ninth. He is besides it relates to your edifice; and signifies, that if you have abridged your omnia, you have left your VANITAS legible at full length. I am, as ever, your affectionate father, B. FRANKLIN. |