and the scientific treat of Italian music.  This I know, however—­and this I will say—­in regard to the amiable and excellent gentleman under description—­that, if I were King of France, Mons. Van Praet should be desired to sit in a roomy, morocco-bottomed, mahogany arm chair—­not to stir therefrom—­but to issue out his edicts, for the delivery of books, to the several athletic myrmidons under his command.  Of course there must be occasional exceptions to this rigid, but upon the whole salutary, “Ordonnance du Roy.”  Indeed I have reason to mention a most flattering exception to it—­in my own favour:  for M. Van Praet would come into the second room, (just mentioned) and with his own hands supply me with half a score volumes at a time—­of such as I wished to examine.  But, generally speaking, this worthy and obliging creature is too lavish of his own personal exertions.  He knows, to be sure, all the bye-passes, and abrupt ascents and descents; and if he be out of sight—­in a moment, through some secret aperture, he returns as quickly through another equally unseen passage.  Upon an average, I set his bibliomaniacal peregrinations down at the rate of a full French league per day.  It is the absence of all pretension and quackery—­the quiet, unobtrusive manner in which he opens his well-charged battery of information upon you—­but, more than all, the glorious honours which are due to him, for having assisted to rescue the book treasures of the Abbey of St. Germain des Pres from destruction, during the horrors of the Revolution—­that cannot fail to secure to him the esteem of the living, and the gratitude of posterity.

[Illustration:  GOLD MEDAL OF LOUIS XII.  From the Cabinet des Medailles at Paris.]

We must now leave this well occupied and richly furnished chamber, and pass on to the fourth room—­in the centre of which is a large raised bronze ornament, representing Apollo and the Muses—­surrounded by the more eminent literary characters of France in the seventeenth century.  It is raised to the glory of the grand monarque Louis XIV. and the figure of Apollo is intended for that of his Majesty.  The whole is a palpable failure:  a glaring exhibition of bad French taste.  Pegasus, the Muses, rocks, and streams, are all scattered about in a very confused manner; without connection, and of course without effect.  Even the French allow it to be “mesquin, et de mauvais gout.”  But let me be methodical.  As you enter this fourth room, you observe, opposite—­before you turn to the right—­a door, having the inscription of CABINET DES MEDAILLES.  This door however is open only twice in the week; when the cabinet is freely and most conveniently shewn.  Of its contents—­in part, precious beyond comparison—­this is the place to say only one little word or two:  for really there would be no end of detail were I to describe even its most remarkable treasures.  Francis I. and his son Henry II. were among its earliest patrons; when the cabinet was deposited in the Louvre.  The former enriched it with a series of valuable gold medals, and among them with one of Louis XII., his predecessor; which has not only the distinction of being beautifully executed, but of being the largest, if not the first of its kind in France.[18]