nger expressed any
astonishment at the severe countenances of the peasants.

But how does it happen, will the reader say, that so delightful a
province of France as that of Le Morvan should have remained for
nineteen centuries unknown to England,--that nation of travellers who
are to be found in every corner of the globe inhabitable and
uninhabitable? How is it that such a pearl,--a sporting country
too,--should have remained buried for so long a period as it were under
the dark mantle of indifference? And is it to be credited that in a
district in which are to be found simultaneously wolves and health, wild
boar and simplicity, the best wines in the world, and all the
theological virtues, should have remained up to this day hidden--lost in
the deep shadows of its woods and the solitude of its mountains?

In the first place, then, I must remind you that in order to reach Le
Morvan it is not necessary to traverse either the Indian Archipelago or
the Cordilleras, or black or ferocious populations. Those who have by
accident passed through it, have not been induced by its appearance to
inscribe its name in their note-books. But Le Morvan is close at hand;
Le Morvan, so to speak, touches England,--a sufficient reason, as every
one knows, for taking no interest in it.

Every year caravans of tourists leave for Italy and the East; they go to
gaze upon the remains of what was once the palace of the famous Zenobia,
Queen of Palmyra, or to kill the lizards on the steps of the mouldering
Coliseum; one invites the scorpions of Greece to bite his leg; another
seeks the yellow fever in the Brazils; a third prefers being robbed in
Calabria, or dying of thirst in the Deserts of Lybia;--the more distant
and perilous the journey, the greater the pleasure of accomplishing it.
Such is English taste.

Yet Le Morvan is a charming and picturesque country--a lovely region,
clad with verdure, flowers, and forest-trees, and watered by fresh,
sparkling, and silvery streams, which every one can reach without
fatigue, much expense, and without the slightest chance of danger, but
perhaps, as I have before said, its proximity is its misfortune.

Should any one after perusing this volume desire to visit Le Morvan, he
should be aware that to do so with any degree of pleasure or profit it
is absolutely necessary to speak French fluently,--for half our
peasants are not in the least aware the earth is round, and that on it
there are other nations be