Imágenes de página
PDF
ePub
[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]

without delight, to see the philosopher likely to become our play fellow. This behaviour had exactly the effect which he meant it should have. He had observed our awkward timidity at his first accosting us, and was determined to rid us of it: all that awe with which, notwithstanding his appearance, his character had inspired us, and that consequent bashfulness which it must have occasioned, was now taken off; his age and awful character disappeared; and our conversation was just as free and as easy as if we had been his equals in years, as in every other respectable qualification. Our discourse now turned on matters of taste and learning. He asked us the extent of our travels; and, as I had visited the Levant, he fixed himself particularly on me, and inquired into several -circumstances relative to the countries where I had been, in many of which I had the good fortune to satisfy him. He lamented his own fate, which had prevented his seeing those curious regions, and descanted with great ability on the advantages and pleasures of travel. However,' said he, I too have been a traveller, and have seen the country in the world which is most worthy our curiosity-I mean England.' He then gave us an account of his abode there, the many civilities he had received, and the delight he felt in thinking of the time he had spent there. However,' continued he, though there is no country under Heaven which produces so many great and shining characters as England, it must be confessed, that it also produces many singular ones, which renders it the more worthy our curiosity, and, indeed, the more entertaining. You are, I suppose, too young to have known the Duke of Montagu: that was one of the most extraordinary characters I ever met with; endowed with the most excellent sense, his singularity knew no bounds. Only think! at my first acquaintance with him, having invited me to his country seat, before I had leisure to get into any sort of intimacy, he practised on me that whimsical trick which, undoubtedly, you have either experienced, or heard of; under the idea of playing the play of an introduction of ambassadors, he soused me over head and ears into a tub of cold water. I thought it odd, to be sure; but a traveller, as you well know, must take the world as it goes, and, indeed, his great goodness to me, and his incomparable understanding, far overpaid me for all the inconveniences of my ducking. Liberty, however, is the glorious cause; that it is, which gives human nature fair play, and allows every singularity to show itself, and which, for one less agreeable oddity it may bring to light, gives to the world ten thousand great and useful examples.

[ocr errors]
[blocks in formation]

"With this, and a great deal more conversation, every word of which I would wish to remember, we finished our walk, and having viewed every part of the villa, which was, as he had told us, altogether imitated from the English style of gardening, we returned to the house, were shown into the drawing-room, and were most politely received by Madame la Baronne and her daughter. Madame de Montesquieu was an heiress of the reformed religion, which she still continued to profess. She was an elderly woman, and apparently had never been handsome. Mademoiselle was a sprightly, affable, good-humoured girl, rather plain, but, at the same time, pleasing; these, with the president's secretary, whom we afterwards found to be an Irishman, formed our society. The secretary spoke nothing but French, and had it been possible that Elliott and I, in our private conversation, could have uttered any thing to the disadvantage of our hosts, we might have been disagreeably trapped by our ignorance of his country; but nothing of that kind could possibly happen; every thing we said was to the praise of the president, and the politeness shown us by his family. Our dinner was plain and plentiful; and when, after having dined, we made an offer to depart, the president insisted upon our stay; nor did he suffer us to leave him for three days, during which time his conversation was as sprightly, as instructive, and as entertaining as possible. At length we took our leave, and returned to Bordeaux, whither we were escorted by the secretary, who now, to our great surprise, spoke English, and declared himself my countryman.

"The baron, though still styled president, had lately resigned that office on the following occasion:-the intendant of the province, a man whose ideas were far more magnificent than merciful, had taken it into his head that he would make Bordeaux the finest city in France, and, for that purpose, had caused to be delineated on paper the plan of a new quarter, where the streets were laid out in the most sumptuous manner, of a great breadth, and in lines directly straight. This plan, with the approbation of the court, he had now began to execute, and that without the least consideration that the streets which he was laying out not only cut through gardens, vineyards, but the houses of citizens and gentlemen, which, if they happened to stand in the way, were instantly levelled with the ground; and that without any determined indemnification to the owner. The president saw this tyranny, detested and resisted it; and, by his influence and authority, for a while suspended the execution. Both parties appealed to Versailles, where the affair was examined into, and where the good pre

sident made use of all his influence in behalf of his countrymen, he himself not being in the smallest degree interested. But the intendant prevailed; and orders were issued, that at all events the plan should be pursued. The president justly discontented, obtained leave to part with his office, and Bordeaux is now the most magnificent city in France, built on the ruin of hundreds. Consider this, ye degenerate Englishmen, who talk without abhorrence of arbitrary power!

"Having remained at Bordeaux a competent time, Elliott and I parted, and I set out for Paris, where I was no sooner arrived, than Monsieur de Montesquieu, who had been there. some days before me, most kindly came to see me, and, during the time of my abode in that metropolis, we saw each other frequently, and every interview increased my esteem and affection for him.

"I have frequently met him in company with ladies, and have been as often astonished at the politeness, the gallantry, and sprightliness of his behaviour. In a word, the most accomplished, the most refined petit-maître of Paris, could not have been more amusing, from the liveliness of his chat, nor could have been more inexhaustible in that sort of discourse which is best suited to women, than this venerable philosopher of seventy years old. But at this we shall not be surprised, when we reflect, that the profound author of L'Esprit des Loix was also author of the Persian Letters, and of the truly gallant Temple de Gnide.

"He had, however, to a great degree, though not among women, one quality, which is not uncommon with abstracted men-I mean absence of mind. I remember dining in company with him at our ambassador's, Lord Albemarle, where, during the time of dinner, being engaged in a warm dispute, he gave away to the servant, who stood behind him, seven clean plates, supposing that he had used them all. But this was only in the heat of controversy, and when he was actuated by that lively and impetuous earnestness, to which, though it never carried him beyond the bounds of good breeding, he was as liable as any man I ever knew. At all other times he was perfectly collected; nor did he ever seem to think of any thing out of the scope of the present conversation.

"In the course of our conversation, Ireland and its interests have often been the topic; and upon these occasions I have always found him an advocate for a union between that country and England. Were I an Irishman,' said he, I should certainly wish for it; and, as a general lover of liberty, I sincerely desire it; and for this plain reason, that an inferior country, connected with one much her superior in force, can

never be certain of the permanent enjoyment of constitutional freedom, unless she has, by her representatives, a proportional share in the legislature of the superior kingdom.'

"A few days before I left Paris to return home, this great man fell sick; and, though I did not imagine, from the nature of his complaint, that it was likely to be fatal, I quitted him, however, with the utmost regret, and with that sort of fores boding, which sometimes precedes misfortunes. Scarcely was I arrived in England, when I received a letter from one whom I desired to send me the most particular accounts of him, communicating to me the melancholy news of his death; and assuring me, what I never doubted, that he had died as he lived, like a real philosopher; and what is more, with true christian resignation. What his real sentiments, with regard to religion, were, I cannot exactly say. He certainly was not a papist; but I have no reason to believe that he was not a christian: in all our conversations, which were perfectly free, I never heard him utter the slightest hint, the least word, which savoured of profaneness; but, on the contrary, when ever it came in his way to mention christianity, he always spoke of its doctrine and of its precepts with the utmost respect and reverence : so that, did I not know that he had too much wisdom and goodness to wish to depreciate the ruling religion, from his general manner of expressing himself, I should make no scruple freely to declare him a perfect christian. At his death the priests, as usual, tormented him, and he bore their exhortations with the greatest patience good humour, and decency; till at length, fatigued by their obstinate and tiresome pertinacity, he told them that he was much obliged for their comfort, but that, having now a very short time to live, he wished to have those few minutes to himself, as he had lived long enough to know how to die. A day or two before his death, an unlucky circumstance happened, by which the world has sustained an irreparable loss. He had written the history of Louis the Eleventh, including the transactions of Europe during the very important and interesting period of that prince's reign. The work was long and laborious, and some, who had seen parts of it, have assured me that it was superior even to his other writings. Recollecting that he had two manuscripts of it, one of them perfect and the other extremely mutilated, and fearing that this imperfect copy might fall into the hands of some ignorant and avaricious bookseller, he gave his valet de chambre the key of his escritoir, and desired him to burn that manuscript, which he described to him. The unlucky valet burnt the fair copy, and left that from which it was impossible to print.

[ocr errors]

1

"There is nothing more uncommon than to see, in the same man, the most ardent glow of genius, the utmost liveliness of fancy, united with the highest degree of assiduity and of laboriousness. The powers of the mind seem in this to resemble those of the body. The nice and ingenious hand of the oculist was never made to heave the sledge, or to till the ground. In Montesquieu, however, both these talents were eminently conspicuous. No man ever possessed a more lively, a more fanciful genius. No man was ever more laborious. His Esprit des Loix is, perhaps, the result of more reading than any treatise ever yet composed. M. de Secondat, son to the president, has now in his possession forty folio volumes in his father's hand writing, which are nothing more than the common-place books, from whence this admirable work was extracted. Montesquieu, indeed, seems to have possessed the difficult art of contracting matter into a small compass, without rendering it obscure, more perfectly than any man who ever wrote. His Grandeur et Decadence des Romains is a rare instance of this talent; a book in which there is more matter than was ever before crammed together in so small a space. One circumstance with regard to this last-mentioned treatise has often struck me, as a sort of criterion by which to judge of the materialness of a book. The index contains nearly as many pages as the work itself."

ANECDOTES OF THE MEXICANS, INCLUDING A DESCRIPTION OF MEXICO, ITS LAKES, &c.

[From Walton's State of the Spanish Colonies.]

ANAHUAC was the original name given to the vale of Mexico, and signifies near to the water. The city of Mexico was anciently called Tenochtitlan; it was founded A. D. 1325, and is, beyond a doubt, much the largest and most beautiful city in the New World. It is situated in latitude 20° 2′ north, and in longitude 100° 34' west, from the meridian of London.

The finest district in the kingdom of Mexico is the vale itself of Mexico, crowned by beautiful and verdant mountains, whose circumference, measured at their base, exceeds one hundred and twenty miles. A great part of this vale is occupied by two lakes; the water of Chalco, the upper lake, is sweet; that of Tezcuco, the lower lake, is brackish. They communicate by a canal. In the lower lake, (on account of its lying in the very bottom of the valley,) all the waters run

« AnteriorContinuar »