set of your travelling
companions. In an instant every tongue is at work, and every individual
bent upon making themselves happy for the moment, and contributing to
the happiness of their fellow travellers. Talking, joking, laughing,
singing, reciting,--every enjoyment which is light and pleasurable is
instantly adopted.--A gentleman takes a box from his pocket, opens it,
and with a look of the most finished politeness, presents it, full of
sweetmeats, to the different ladies in succession. One of these, in
gratitude for this attention, proposes that which she well knows will be
agreeable to the whole party, some species of round game like our
cross-purposes, involving forfeits. The proposal is carried by
acclamation,--the game is instantly begun, and every individual is
included: Woe be now to the aristocracy of the interior! Old and young,
honest and dishonest, respectable and disrespectable, all are involved
in undistinguished confusion--but all are content to be so, and happy in
the exchange. The game in the meantime proceeds, and the different
forfeits become more numerous. The generality of these ensure, indeed,
from their nature, a punctuality of performance. To kiss the handsomest
woman in the party, to pay her a compliment in some extempore effusion,
or to whisper a confidence (_faire une confidence_) in her ear--all
these are hardly enjoined before they are happily accomplished. But
others, which it would be difficult to particularize, are more amusing
in their consequences, and less easy, in their execution.

The ludicrous effect of this scene is much heightened by its being often
carried on in the dark, for night brings no cessation; and we have
ourselves, in travelling in this manner in the diligence, engaged in
many a game of forfeits where, it is not too much to say, that our
play-fellows, of both sexes, were certainly nearer to the grave than
the cradle, being somewhere between fifty and fourscore. The scenes
which then take place, the undistinguished clamours of young and old,
the audible salutes from every quarter, which point to the perpetual
succession of the forfeits, altogether compose a spectacle, which to a
stranger is the most unexpected and extraordinary that can be possibly
imagined.

The conversation of a Frenchman, who possesses wit and information, is
certainly superior to that of a clever man of any other country. It has
a variety and playfulness, which, upon subjects of taste or fancy, o