rts, about them; in case they happen
to pass any exhibition or building that is open to a stranger on
producing his passport, it is well to be provided with it, or if he
should meet with any accident, or that any casuality should occur, it
will always be found useful. When you arrive at the port where you
disembark in coming from England, your passport is taken from you and
sent on to Paris, and what is called a Carte de Surete is given you
instead, for which you pay 2 francs; this you must give to the mistress
of the hotel where you lodge at Paris, and she will procure your
original passport for you from the police, or if you choose you may go
for it yourself, and save the charge of the commissioner who would be
employed to fetch it. In returning to England, you take it to the
English Ambassador's to be signed, and from thence to the police for the
same purpose, but only state that you are going to the port from whence
you are to embark, as if you say that you are going to England they send
you to the Minister of Foreign Affairs for his signature, where there is
a charge of ten francs, which there is not the slightest necessity of
incurring. I have been very often from Paris to London and never paid by
following the plan I have stated, but for a permit to embark there is
always 30 sous to pay, at the port on quitting the country.

In all the diligences throughout France the places are numbered, and he
who comes first has the first choice, in which case most persons choose
No. 1, but others who prefer sitting with their backs to the horses
select No. 3; this excellent regulation prevents any kind of dispute
about seats. If you have much luggage you are required to send it an
hour or so before the coach starts, and in travelling by the Malle-Poste
(or Mail) if your trunk be very large, and weighty, they will not take
it, therefore you must ascertain that point when you take your place; it
is always sent by a diligence which follows, but a delay is occasioned
which sometimes proves inconvenient. The mails are dearer than the
diligence, and some go eleven miles an hour.

With regard to posting, the price is 2 francs each horse for a
miriametre or six miles and a quarter, and as many horses as there are
persons in the carriage must be paid for; 15 sous is what should be
given to the postillion, but most people give a franc. The posting is
entirely in the hands of government, and where the horses are kept is
not always an i