If we were disagreeably disappointed in the antiquities of the town, we were as agreeably disappointed in the inn.  It was clean, gave us a good dinner, and, as almost invariably proves to be the case in France, also gave us good beds.  I do not remember ever to have been more fatigued than by the five posts between Paris and this place.  The uneven paves, the random and careless driving of the postillions, with whom it is a point of honour to gallop over the broken streets of the villages, besides having a strong fellow-feeling for the smiths, always makes the eight or ten posts nearest to Paris, much the most disagreeable part of a journey to or from the French capital.

We dined at six, exhausted the curiosities of Senlis, and went to bed by daylight!

The next morning was fresh and bland, and I walked ahead of the carriage.  A wood-cutter was going to the forests to make faggots, and we fell into discourse.  This man assured me that he should get only ten sous for his day’s work!  The view of the principal church-tower of Senlis as beautiful, and, in a slight degree, it carried the mind back to the fifteenth century.

You have travelled to and from Paris with me so often, that I can only add we found the same fatiguing monotony, on this occasion, as on all the others.  We reached Peronne early, and ordered beds.  Before dinner we strolled around the ramparts, which are pleasant of themselves though the place stands in a marsh, which renders its position not only strong, but strongly disagreeable.  We endeavoured in vain to find some features to revive the pictures of “Quentin Durward.”  There was no sign of a soldier in the place, though barracks were building.  The French are evidently less jealous of this frontier, than of that on the east, or the one next the Austrians.

The next morning we breakfasted at Cambray.  Here we found a garrison, and considerable activity.  The citadel is well placed, and the esplanade is a pretty walk.  We visited the cathedral, which contains a monument to Fenelon, by our friend David.  We were much gratified by this work, which ranks among his best.  Near Valenciennes we broke a tire, and were detained two hours.  Here the garrison was still stronger, the place in better condition, and the troops mounted guard with their marching accoutrements about them; all of which, I presume, was owing to the fact, that this is the last fortified town on the road.  We did not get to the frontier until seven, and the French postilions broke another bolt before we got fairly rid of them, compelling us to wait an hour to have it mended.  We were now in a low wet country, or one perfectly congenial to cholera; it was just the hour when the little demons of miasma are said to be the most active, and to complete the matter, we learned that the disease was in the village.  The carriage-windows were closed, while I walked about, from door to door, to pacify uneasiness by curiosity.  Use, however, had made us all tolerably indifferent, and little P——­ settled the matter by remarking it was nothing after all, for here only two or three died daily, while at Paris there had been a thousand!  Older heads than his, often take material facts more in a lump than this.