A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy

hazard, they fell into your way, that the prospect would not affect you.

I have something within me which cannot bear the shock of the least indecent insinuation: in the sportability of chit-chat I have often endeavoured to conquer it, and with infinite pain have hazarded a thousand things to a dozen of the sex together, - the least of which I could not venture to a single one to gain heaven.

Excuse me, Monsieur le Count, said I; - as for the nakedness of your land, if I saw it, I should cast my eyes over it with tears in them; - and for that of your women (blushing at the idea he had excited in me) I am so evangelical in this, and have such a fellow-feeling for whatever is weak about them, that I would cover it with a garment if I knew how to throw it on: - But I could wish, continued I, to spy the nakedness of their hearts, and through the different disguises of customs, climates, and religion, find out what is good in them to fashion my own by: - and therefore am I come.

It is for this reason, Monsieur le Count, continued I, that I have not seen the Palais Royal, - nor the Luxembourg, - nor the Facade of the Louvre, - nor have attempted to swell the catalogues we have of pictures, statues, and churches. - I conceive every fair being as a temple, and would rather enter in, and see the original drawings and loose sketches hung up in it, than the Transfiguration of Raphael itself.

The thirst of this, continued I, as impatient as that which inflames the breast of the connoisseur, has led me from my own home into France, - and from France will lead me through Italy; - ’tis a quiet journey of the heart in pursuit of Nature, and those affections which arise out of her, which make us love each other, - and the world, better than we do.

The Count said a great many civil things to me upon the occasion; and added very politely, how much he stood obliged to Shakespeare for making me known to him. - But a propos, said he; - Shakespeare is full of great things; - he forgot a small punctilio of announcing your name: - it puts you under a necessity of doing it yourself.

THE PASSPORT. VERSAILLES.

 There is not a more perplexing affair in life to me, than to set about telling any one who I am, - for there is scarce any body I cannot give a better account of than myself; and I have often wished I could do it in a single word, - and have an end of it.  It was the only time and occasion in my life I could accomplish this to any purpose; - for Shakespeare lying upon the table, and recollecting I was in his books, I took up Hamlet, and turning immediately to the grave-diggers’ scene in the fifth act, I laid my finger upon Yorick, and advancing the book to the Count, with my finger all the way over the name, - Me voici! said I.

Now, whether the idea of poor Yorick’s skull was put out of the Count’s mind by the reality of my own, or by what magic he could drop a period of seven or eight hundred years, makes nothing in this account; - ’tis certain the French conceive better than they combine; - I wonder at nothing in this world, and the less at this; inasmuch as one of the first of our own Church, for whose candour and paternal sentiments I have the highest veneration, fell into the same mistake in the very same case: - “He could not bear,” he said, “to look into the sermons wrote by the King of Denmark’s jester.”  Good, my Lord said I; but there are two Yoricks.  The Yorick your Lordship thinks of, has been dead and buried eight hundred years ago; he flourished in Horwendillus’s court; - the other Yorick is myself, who have flourished, my Lord, in no court. - He shook his head.  Good God! said I, you might as well confound Alexander the Great with Alexander the Coppersmith, my lord! - “’Twas all one,” he replied. -

- If Alexander, King of Macedon, could have translated your Lordship, said I, I’m sure your Lordship would not have said so.

The poor Count de B- fell but into the same error.

- Et, Monsieur, est-il Yorick? cried the Count. - Je le suis, said I. - Vous? - Moi, - moi qui ai l’honneur de vous parler, Monsieur le Comte. - Mon Dieu! said he, embracing me, - Vous etes Yorick!

The Count instantly put the Shakespeare into his pocket, and left me alone in his room.

THE PASSPORT. VERSAILLES.

 I could not conceive why the Count de B- had gone so abruptly out of the room, any more than I could conceive why he had put the Shakespeare into his pocket. -

Mysteries which must explain themselves are not worth the loss of time which a conjecture about them takes up: ’twas better to read Shakespeare; so taking up “Much Ado AboutNothing,” I transported myself instantly from the chair I sat in to Messina in Sicily, and got so busy with Don Pedro, and Benedict, and Beatrice, that I thought not of Versailles, the Count, or the passport.

Sweet pliability of man’s spirit, that can at once surrender itself to illusions, which cheat expectation and sorrow of their weary moments! - Long, - long since had ye number’d out my days, had I not trod so great a part of them upon this enchanted ground.  When my way is too rough for my feet, or too steep for my strength, I get off it, to some smooth velvet path, which Fancy has scattered over with rosebuds of delights; and having taken a few turns in it, come back strengthened and refresh’d. - When evils press sore upon me, and there is no retreat from them in this world, then I take a new course; - I leave it, - and as I have a clearer idea of the Elysian fields than I have of heaven, I force myself, like AEneas, into them. - I see him meet the pensive shade of his forsaken Dido, and wish to recognise it; - I see the injured spirit wave her head, and turn off silent from the author of her miseries and dishonours; - I lose the feelings for myself in hers, and in those affections which were wont to make me mourn for her when I was at school.

Surely this is not walking in a vain shadow - nor does man disquiet himself in vainby it: - he oftener does so in trusting the issue of his commotions to reason only. - I can safely say for myself, I was never able to conquer any one single bad sensation in my heart so decisively, as beating up as fast as I could for some kindly and gentle sensation to fight it upon its own ground

When I had got to the end of the third act the Count de B- entered, with my passport in his hand.  Monsieur le Duc de C-, said the Count, is as good a prophet, I dare say, as he is a statesman.  Un homme qui rit, said the Duke, ne sera jamais dangereux. - Had it been for any one but the king’s jester, added the Count, I could not have got it these two hours. - Pardonnez moi, Monsieur le Count, said I - I am not the king’s jester. - But you are Yorick? - Yes. - Et vous plaisantez? - I answered, Indeed I did jest, - but was not paid for it; - ’twas entirely at my own expense.

We have no jester at court, Monsieur le Count, said I; the last we had was in the licentious reign of Charles II.; - since which time our manners have been so gradually refining, that our court at present is so full of patriots, who wish for nothing but the honours and wealth of their country; - and our ladies are all so chaste, so spotless, so good, so devout, - there is nothing for a jester to make a jest of. -

Voila un persiflage! cried the Count.

THE PASSPORT. VERSAILLES.

 As the passport was directed to all lieutenant-governors, governors, and commandants of cities, generals of armies, justiciaries, and all officers of justice, to let Mr. Yorick the king’s jester, and his baggage, travel quietly along, I own the triumph of obtaining the passport was not a little tarnish’d by the figure I cut in it. - But there is nothing unmix’d in this world; and some of the gravest of our divines have carried it so far as to affirm, that enjoyment itself was attended even with a sigh, - and that the greatest they knew of terminated, in a general way, in little better than a convulsion.

I remember the grave and learned Bevoriskius, in his Commentary upon the Generations from Adam, very