Although I have observed that in great commercial undertakings, the French are very slow and cautious, yet they are progressing visibly; there are now thirty-four coal mines at work in various parts of France, belonging to different public companies more or less flourishing, besides private enterprises, 16 more in agitation where coal has been found, and societies formed but not yet in active operation, and 15 now working in Belgium, of which the sharers are principally French.  There are twenty Asphalte and Bitumen companies.  Thirty-five Assurance companies, between twenty and thirty railway ditto, about the same number for canals and nearly as many for steam boats, and for bridges projected about 20, for gas, 14, for the bringing into cultivation the marshes and waste lands, 7, for markets, bazaars, and depots, 10, and for manufactures of glass, earthenware, soap and a variety of other things, there are about forty more public companies.  These are such as now still offer their shares for sale; there are many others which have been for a length of time established, which no longer issue either advertisement or prospectus, but when enterprises of this kind are undertaken in France they generally succeed.

CHAPTER XI.

     The Literature of the time being, principal authors.  Music; its
     ancient date in France, performers, and singers.

Of the present state of literature in France, it is not possible to draw a very flattering picture; there is a good deal of moderate talent but certainly none that is transcendental, which remark may be applied to statesmen, orators, authors, artists, etc.; as to poetry there appears at present so little taste for it, and writers seem so thoroughly aware of its being the case, that they have too much good sense to attempt to obtrude it upon the public, and those who had obtained a certain reputation as poets seem to write no more.  The works of de Lamartine certainly have many admirers, displaying a pleasing style of versification fraught with beautiful imagery, a happy arrangement of ideas enwreathed within the flowers of language, but little or no originality.  As if himself conscious of that circumstance, he brought forth his Chute d’un Ange (the fall of an angel), which caused his own fall at the same time; if his sole desire was to attain originality, he gained his point, but at the price of common sense; the majority of the public appear to have been of this opinion, and M. de Lamartine seems to have passed from poetry to politics, being now one of the best and most conspicuous speakers in the Chamber of Deputies.  A certain tone runs through M. de Lamartine’s works, that leads one to infer he has deeply read and admired Lord Byron.  M. Casimir Delavigne was a great favourite at one period; it might be my want of taste, or a deficiency in the knowledge of the French language sufficient to relish that class of poetry, but certainly