very
confined; and even were opportunities now afforded of establishing a
trade with foreign nations, it would be long before France could benefit
by it, from the total want of established and creditable houses.

The manifest signs of the decay of commerce in France cannot escape the
observation of the traveller, more especially if he has been in the
habit of travelling in England. The public diligences are few in number,
and most miserably managed. It is difficult to say whether the
carriage, the horses, or the harness, gives most the idea of meanness.
Excepting in the neighbourhood of large towns, you meet with not a cart,
or waggon, for twenty that the same distance would show in England. The
roads are indeed excellent in most parts; but this is not in France, as
in most countries, a proof of a flourishing commerce. It is for the
conveyance of military stores, and to facilitate the march of the
troops, that the police are required to keep the roads in good repair.
The villages and towns throughout France, are in a state of dilapidation
from want of repair. No new houses, shops, and warehouses building, as
we behold every where in England. None of that hurry and bustle in the
streets, and on the quays of the sea-port towns, which our blessed
country can always boast. The dress of the people, their food, their
style of living, their amusements, their houses, all bespeak extreme
poverty and want of commerce.

I was at some pains in ascertaining whether, in many of their
manufactures, they were likely to rival us or injure our own.--I cannot
say I have found one of consequence. There are indeed one or two
articles partially in demand among us, in which the French have the
superiority; silks, lace, gloves, black broad cloth, and cambric are
the chief among them. The woollen cloths in France are extremely
beautiful, and the finer sorts, I think, of a superior texture to any
thing we have in England; but the price is always double, and sometimes
treble of what they sell for at home, so that we have not much to fear
from their importations. Few of the French can afford to wear these fine
cloths.

French watches are manufactured at about one half of the English price;
but the workmanship is very inferior to ours, and unless as trinkets for
ladies' wear, they do not seem much in estimation in England. The
cutlery in France is wretched. Not only the steel, but the temper and
polish, are far inferior to ours. A pair of Englis