slow. The journey seldom exceeds
eight leagues, about four and twenty miles a day: and as those people
have certain fixed stages, you are sometimes obliged to rise in a
morning before day; a circumstance very grievous to persons in ill
health. These inconveniences, however, were over-balanced by other
agreemens. We no, sooner quitted Lyons, than we got into summer
weather, and travelling through a most romantic country, along the
banks of the Rhone, had opportunities (from the slowness of our pace)
to contemplate its beauties at leisure.

The rapidity of the Rhone is, in a great measure, owing to its being
confined within steep banks on each side. These are formed almost
through its whole course, by a double chain of mountains, which rise
with all abrupt ascent from both banks of the river. The mountains are
covered with vineyards, interspersed with small summer-houses, and in
many places they are crowned with churches, chapels, and convents,
which add greatly to the romantic beauty of the prospect. The highroad,
as far as Avignon, lies along the side of the river, which runs almost
in a straight line, and affords great convenience for inland commerce.
Travellers, bound to the southern parts of France, generally embark in
the diligence at Lyons, and glide down this river with great velocity,
passing a great number of towns and villages on each side, where they
find ordinaries every day at dinner and supper. In good weather, there
is no danger in this method of travelling, 'till you come to the Pont
St. Esprit, where the stream runs through the arches with such
rapidity, that the boat is sometimes overset. But those passengers who
are under any apprehension are landed above-bridge, and taken in again,
after the boat has passed, just in the same manner as at London Bridge.
The boats that go up the river are drawn against the stream by oxen,
which swim through one of the arches of this bridge, the driver sitting
between the horns of the foremost beast. We set out from Lyons early on
Monday morning, and as a robbery had been a few days before committed
in that neighbourhood, I ordered my servant to load my musquetoon with
a charge of eight balls. By the bye, this piece did not fail to attract
the curiosity and admiration of the people in every place through which
we passed. The carriage no sooner halted, than a crowd immediately
surrounded the man to view the blunderbuss, which they dignified with
the title of petit canon.