We had, at first arrival, an inundation of visits pouring in upon us, for all the English are acquainted, and herd much together, and it is no easy matter to disengage oneself from them, so that one sees but little of the French themselves.  To be introduced to people of high quality it is absolutely necessary to be master of the language.  There is not a house where they do not play, nor is any one at all acceptable unless he does so, too, a professed gamester being the most advantageous character a man can have at Paris.  The abbes and men of learning are of easy access enough, but few English that travel have knowledge enough to take any great pleasure in that company.

We are exceedingly unsettled and irresolute; don’t know our own minds for two moments together, and try to bring ourselves to a state of perfect apathy.  In short, I think the greatest evil that could have happened to us is our liberty, for we are not at all capable to determine our own actions.

TO HIS MOTHER

Lyons, October 13, 1739. We have been to see a famous monastery, called the Grand Chartreuse, and had no reason to think our time lost.  After having travelled seven days, very slow (for we did not change horses, it being impossible for a chaise to go post in these roads), we arrived at a little village among the mountains of Savoy, called Echelles; from thence we proceeded on horses, who are used to the way, to the mountain of the Chartreuse.  It is six miles to the top; the road runs winding up it, commonly not six feet broad; on one hand is the rock, with woods of pine-trees hanging overhead; on the other, a monstrous precipice, almost perpendicular, at the bottom of which rolls a torrent, that sometimes is tumbling among the fragments of stone that have fallen from on high, and sometimes precipitating itself down vast descents with a noise like thunder, which is made still greater by the echo from the mountains on each side, concurs to form one of the most solemn, the most romantic, and the most astonishing scenes I ever beheld.  Add to this the strange views made by the crags and cliffs on the other hand, the cascades that in many places throw themselves from the very summit down into the vale and the river below.

This place St. Bruno chose to retire to, and upon its very top founded the convent, which is the superior of the whole order.  When we came there, the two fathers who are commissioned to entertain strangers (for the rest must neither speak to one another nor to anyone else) received us very kindly, and set before us a repast of dried fish, eggs, butter, and fruits, all excellent in their kind, and extremely neat.  They pressed us to spend the night there, and to stay some days with them; but this we could not do, so they led us about their house, which is like a little city, for there are 100 fathers, besides 300 servants, that make their clothes, grind their corn, press their wine, and do everything among themselves.  The whole is quite orderly and simple; nothing of finery, but the wonderful decency and the strange situation more than supply the place of it.