arden. I acknowledge the advantages,
perhaps the necessity, of such institutions; but they always appear to
me as if there was disarrangement instead of arrangement. What may be
called order and classification seems to me to be disorder and
confusion. It may be very well to class plants and trees for study, but
certainly their families, although joined by man, were never intended to
be united by God. Such a mixture in one partition, of trees, and
shrubs, and creeping plants, all of which you are gravely told are of
one family. I never will believe it: it is unnatural. I can see order
and arrangement when I look at the majestic forest-trees throwing about
their wild branches, and defying the winds of heaven, while they afford
shelter to the shrubs beneath, which in their turn protect and shelter
the violets that perfume all around. This is beautiful and natural--it
is harmony; but in a botanical garden every thing is out of its place.
The Scripture says, "Those whom God hath joined let no man put asunder;"
may we not add, Those whom God hath sundered let no man presume to join.
I felt as I looked at the botanical garden as if it were presumptuous
and almost wicked, and as it was on the banks of the Meuse, I sat down
on the wall and recovered myself by looking at the flowing river, and
thinking about utility and futility, "and all that sort of thing and
everything else in the world," as poor Matthews used to say,--and there
I sat for an hour, until my thoughts revolved on the propriety of going
back and eating my dinner,--as Mrs Trollope used to do when she was in
Belgium.

As I was walking about in the evening, I perceived a dirty little alley
illuminated with chandeliers and wax candles. There must be a ball,
thought I, or some gaiety going on: let us inquire. "No, sir," replied
a man to whom I put the question, "it's not a ball,--it is a Monsieur
who has presented to an image of the Virgin Mary which is up that court,
a petticoat, which, they say, is worth one thousand five hundred francs,
and this lighting-up is in honour of her putting it on." The race of
fools is not extinct, thought I. I wonder whether, like King Ferdinand,
he worked it himself. Belgium is certainly at this present the
stronghold of superstition.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN.

June 3.
Went to Harquet's manufactory of arms, and was much amused. They export
all over the world,