. It cannot continue for
ever, and you will be brought up with a severe round turn before you are
many years older--such is my prophecy.

We had not been settled at Blois a month before we had orders to quit it
and to proceed to Gueret on the river Creuse. We understood the allied
army having entered France was the cause of our removal.

As I had never heard of Gueret before, I requested my landlord to give me
some information respecting it. "Why," said he, with a most awful shrug of
his shoulders, "it is where Louis the Fourteenth banished his _petite
noblesse_, and is now filled with lawyers, who, as the town is small and
the inhabitants are not numerous, go to law with each other to keep
themselves, I suppose, in practice. Oh, you will find the roads rough and
much out of order; we call it '_un chemin perdu_,' and as the town is
insignificant, and produces nothing, we call it '_un endroit inconnu_.' I
do not think," added he, "there are more than _cinquante cheminees a feu_
in the whole town."

This information did not raise my spirits. However, there was no
alternative, and it was of little use to be downhearted. The weather
continued very severe, and we had again to encounter frost, snow, and
intense cold. We prayed for the humane Emperor of France, and wished him
elevated on Haman's gibbet. Our journey was most horrible and fatiguing;
the roads in some places were literally lost, and we were obliged to drive
over ploughed fields in order to avoid the deep ruts. I thought we should
have had all our bones dislocated. The five days we were on this wretched
road will never be effaced from my memory. We slept where we could. Inns
there were very few, and those few the abodes of poverty, filth, and rags.
The small farms sometimes took us in, where, whilst eating the coarse
brown bread and tough fowls they put before us, and for which they made us
pay most extravagantly, the pigs and poultry kept us company during our
repast.

One night, at one of these abominable places, I was obliged to lie on a
table, as they had not a bed to give me. I was awakened early by a most
horrible smell. I thought I should be suffocated. I procured a light and
inspected the room. On opening an old press I found several half-putrid
cheeses, full of jumping gentlemen, and probably ladies, for there was a
large assembly of them. I made my escape from this savoury, not
sweet-smelling den, and threw myself into what they called a chair, which,