FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127  
128   129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   >>   >|  
e, too, I thought of you. I was sure you had seen with pleasure the sublime triumphal arch of Marius at the entrance of the city. I went then to the Arena. Would you believe, Madam, that in this eighteenth century, in France, under the reign of Louis XVI., they are at this moment pulling down the circular wall of this superb remain to pave a road? And that too from a hill which is itself an entire mass of stone, just as fit, and more accessible? A former intendant, a M. de Basville, has rendered his memory dear to the traveller and amateur, by the pains he took to preserve and restore these monuments of antiquity. The present one (I do not know who he is) is demolishing the object to make a good road to it. I thought of you again, and I was then in great good humor, at the _Pont du Gard_, a sublime antiquity, and well preserved. But most of all here, where Roman taste, genius, and magnificence excite ideas analogous to yours at every step. I could no longer oppose the inclination to avail myself of your permission to write to you, a permission given with too much complaisance by you, and used by me with too much indiscretion. Madame de Tott did me the same honor. But she being only the descendant of some of those puny heroes who boiled their own kettles before the walls of Troy, I shall write to her from a Grecian, rather than a Roman canton: when I shall find myself, for example, among her Phocaean relations at Marseilles. Loving, as you do, Madam, the precious remains of antiquity, loving architecture, gardening, a warm sun, and a clear sky, I wonder you have never thought of moving Chaville to Nismes. This, as you know, has not always been deemed impracticable; and, therefore, the next time a _Surintendant des bailments du roi_, after the example of M. Colbert, sends persons to Nismes to move the _Maison Quarree_ to Paris, that they may not come empty-handed, desire them to bring Chaville with them to replace it. _A propos_ of Paris. I have now been three weeks from there, without knowing any thing of what has passed. I suppose I shall meet it all at Aix, where I have directed my letters to be lodged, _poste restante_. My journey has given me leisure to reflect on this _Assemblee des Notables_. Under a good and a young King, as the present, I think good may be made of it. I would have the deputies, then, by all means, so conduct themselves as to encourage him to repeat the calls of this Assembly. Their first step s
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   103   104   105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127  
128   129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
thought
 

antiquity

 

present

 

Nismes

 

Chaville

 
permission
 
sublime
 

Surintendant

 
impracticable
 

deemed


pleasure

 

bailments

 
Quarree
 

Maison

 
persons
 

Colbert

 
triumphal
 
moving
 

Phocaean

 

relations


Marseilles

 

Loving

 

Marius

 

canton

 

precious

 

remains

 

loving

 

architecture

 

gardening

 

handed


Notables

 
Assemblee
 

reflect

 

restante

 

journey

 
leisure
 

encourage

 
repeat
 

conduct

 
Assembly

deputies
 

lodged

 
knowing
 
propos
 

desire

 

replace

 
directed
 

letters

 
passed
 

suppose