que vous avez deux ou trois belles loix ; mais il est insoutenable que vous ayez la présomption de dire que vous avez une constitution. Cependant il faut convenir que la jalousie nationale a été clairvoyante, et leur a très-bien fait découvrir qu'il y avoit une grande distance de la théorie de Montesquieu et de De Lolme à la pratique réelle, à l'état vrai des choses. J'ai revu la traduction, mais ce fut un travail fort rapide, une révision avec l'homme dont vous connoissez la turbulente impatience; vous ne serez juge que des fautes qui restent, et non de celles que j'ai fait disparoître, et cette comparaison seule pourroit me mériter un peu d'indulgence.

Mille amitiés, je vous prie, à nos amis communs. Je suis fort pressé pour finir.

Aimez-moi comme je vous aime.

LETTER LV.

TO M. DUMONT.

ET. DUMONT.

Dear Dumont,

July 28, 1789. I sit down to write a few lines to you as fast as I can before I set out on the circuit, which will be early tomorrow morning. I shall return in about a fortnight, and how I shall dispose of myself during the vacation is yet uncertain. It is true that you have written me some very long letters, but that was long ago. Since affairs have

that you have two or three fine laws; but then you have the unwarrantable presumption to assert that you have a constitution. Nevertheless, it must be allowed that the national jealousy has been clear-sighted, and has very properly made them discover that there is a wide difference between the theory of Montesquieu and De Lolme and actual practice-the real state of things. I have gone through the translation; but revising, with a man whose boisterous impatience you well know, was hurried work. You can only judge of the faults which remain, and not of those which I have struck out; and yet this comparison alone can entitle me to any indulgence. Best remembrances to our mutual friends.

Yours, in haste, &c.

ET. DUMONT.

been in such a state in France as must make every man who has the least humanity impatient for news, you have not let me hear from you once.

I am sure I need not tell you how much I have rejoiced at the Revolution which has taken place. I think of nothing else, and please myself with endeavouring to guess at some of the important consequences which must follow throughout all Europe. I think myself happy that it has happened when I am of an age at which I may reasonably hope to live to see some of those consequences produced. It will perhaps surprise you, but it is certainly true, that the Revolution has produced a very sincere and very general joy here. It is the subject of all conversations; and even all the newspapers, without one exception, though they are not conducted by the most liberal or most philosophical of men, join in sounding forth the praises of the Parisians, and in rejoicing at an event so important for mankind.

Pray congratulate Mirabeau on my behalf; tell him that I admire and envy him the noble part he is acting. The force of truth obliges me to say this, though I am really offended with him (and I wish you would tell him so), for having very wantonly bestowed on me a very undeserved panegyric. The book in which it is contained is certainly, upon the whole, well translated; but there are some errors in it which I would correct, and send you or him the corrections, if I thought there were any probability of its passing through a second edition.

You have never sent me the third and fourth letter of Mirabeau to his constituents: I wish you would get them for me to complete my set. When is M. Clavière's great work to appear? I don't know whether I told him not by any means to use the name of Dr. Price as an autho

1 The following is the passage alluded to:-"Je dois ce travail, entrepris uniquement pour la France, à un Anglais qui, jeune encore, a mérité une haute réputation, et que ceux dont il est particulièrement connu regardent comme une des espérances de son pays. C'est un de ces philosophes respectables, dont le civisme ne se borne point à la Grande Bretagne," &c. See Dumont's Tactique des Assemb. Législat., vol. i. p. 285, 2nd edit.

rity for the information he communicated to him through me. Be so good, therefore, as to tell him that Dr. Price begs he may not be named.

My brother and sister beg to be very affectionately remembered to you. They think we should all be happier, sitting in their little parlour in Frith Street, than being spectators of the revolutions in France, and the tragedies which attend them. We have just heard the news of the murder of Foulon and his son-in-law, which no doubt everybody, and chiefly the friends of the people, must consider as a very unfortunate event. Adieu! Believe me to be, with unalterable affection,

Si vous avez pu croire que c'étoit par oubli ou par négligence que nous n'avons pas répondu à vos dernières lettres, Monsieur, et que nous avons gardé un si long silence, vous nous avez fait une grande injustice. La multitude de scènes, d'idées, d'évènemens, par lesquels nous avons passé, nous ont causé tant d'agitations, que, même en pensant plus que jamais à nos amis, il étoit impossible de leur écrire. Combien de fois, Monsieur, vous avez été présent à mon esprit, pendant ces trois mois qui feront époque dans ma vie, par tant de raisons! C'est à vous,

LETTER LVI.

Paris, August 27, 1789. If you can have believed that it has been through forgetfulness or neglect that we have not answered your last letters, Sir, and that we have so long been silent, you have done us great injustice. The multitude of scenes, of ideas, of events through which we have passed, have thrown us into a state of so much agitation, that, whilst we have thought more than ever of our friends, we have found it impossible to write to them. How often have you been present to my mind during the last three months, which, for so many reasons, will form an epoch in my life! It is to you, Sir, that I must turn when

VOL. I.

T

Monsieur, que j'ai besoin de parler de la Suisse ; personne ici ne m'entend, et je sais bien que vous m'entendrez, me comprendrez, car vous connoissez ce pays favorisé du Ciel, et vous étiez digne de le parcourir. Je n'ai été que dans une bien petite partie de la Suisse, mais j'en ai vû assez pour juger de tout ce que la Nature y a accumulé de grand, de beau, de sublime, pour l'admiration des âmes sensibles. J'ai éprouvé là des sensations qui m'étoient inconnues, et en vérité trop délicieuses; car elles m'ont laissé beaucoup trop de regrets d'être destinée à vivre si loin des objets ravissans qui les causoient. J'ai visité cette île 1 où Rousseau a joui de quelques mois de bonheur, du seul qui étoit fait pour lui, auquel il étoit accessible, celui qu'il trouvoit dans la contemplation de la nature et de lui-même. Nous y avons retrouvé encore ce même calme dont il a sû si bien jouir, qu'il a sû si bien peindre, et qu'il a si vainement recherché depuis. J'ai vû Genève, encore dans une ivresse, ou, si vous voulez, une illusion de bonheur, qu'il seroit cruel et barbare de détruire et de troubler. J'ai vû dans le canton de Berne, sous un gouvernement haïssable par ses formes, mais doux dans ses effets, un peuple tranquille et heureux,

I would talk about Switzerland; no one here understands me; and I am well aware that you will, and will feel with me on this subject; for you know that country, so favoured by Heaven, and you were worthy to know it. I have only been in a very small part of Switzerland; but I have seen enough to form an idea of all the grandeur, the beauty, the sublimity which Nature has there thrown together for the admiration of men of feeling. I there felt emotions to which I was before a stranger, and which, indeed, were too delightful; for they have left behind them too much regret that I should be destined to live so far from the enchanting scenes which called them forth. I visited that island where Rousseau enjoyed a few months of happiness, the only happiness which was made for him, and to which he was accessible, that which he found in the contemplation of nature and of himself. We found there the same tranquillity which he knew so well how to enjoy and to describe, and which he has so vainly sought for since. I saw Geneva, which was still in an intoxication, or, if you will, a dream of happiness, which it would be cruel and barbarous to destroy or disturb. I saw in the canton of Berne, under a government hateful in its forms, but gentle in its effects, a happy and contented people, sheltered by the comfort and

1 L'île de Saint Pierre, in the middle of the Lake of Bienne.

garanti par son aisance et sa prospérité, encore mieux que par ses montagnes, des orages et des révolutions qui désolent d'autres contrées. C'est au milieu de ces vallées fortunées, où le bonheur doit être bien plus facile, puisqu'il y est dépouillé de tant de biens factices, c'est là où il seroit si doux de vivre et d'oublier le reste du monde, que la nouvelle des désastres de la France est venue m'atteindre. Quoique la succession la plus inconcevable d'évènemens inespérés ait ensuite un peu calmé nos alarmes, nous avions un trop grand besoin de venir rejoindre tout ce qui nous étoit cher, pour continuer paisiblement notre voyage. Nous l'avons donc précipité, et nous sommes depuis peu de jours de retour au sein de notre famille, encore émues du bonheur d'avoir retrouvé tant d'objets chéris, préservés de tous maux, au milieu de tant de dangers.

Je ne vous dirai aucune nouvelle, Monsieur; vous êtes mieux informé sûrement que peut-être je ne le suis moimême. L'inquiétude est encore le sentiment dominant, et surtout sur l'objet des finances. Mais les biens dont nous allons jouir ne sauroient être trop achetés; on se fera gloire même des soucis et des peines dont on les payera. Et vous, Monsieur, qui seriez si digne de voir

prosperity of their condition, still more than by their mountains, from the storms and revolutions by which other countries are laid waste. It was in the midst of those favoured valleys, where happiness is the more accessible that it is there stripped of so many factitious pleasures,—it was there, where it would be so delightful to live and to forget the rest of the world, that the news of the disasters of France reached me. Although the most inconceivable succession of unhoped-for events has since, in some degree, allayed our fears, we felt too strongly the want of being reunited to all that was dear to us to continue our journey in peace. We accordingly hastened our return, and have now been some days at home in the bosom of our family, and are still under the joyful emotion of having found so many objects of our love, preserved from all harm in the midst of so many dangers.

I shall send you no news, Sir, for you are, no doubt, as well informed, perhaps better than I am myself. Anxiety is still the prevailing feeling, especially on the subject of finance. But the blessings which we are going to enjoy can scarcely be too dearly purchased; we shall even glory in the cares and privations by which we shall have paid for them. And you, Sir, who are so worthy to be a near spectator