n
fire. Nothing can certainly be more destructive of all ideas of feminine
delicacy, than to see a beautiful woman with one of these midnight bowls
burning before her, and when her complexion is rendered livid by its
flames, looking through this medium like some unknown but voracious
inhabitant of another world.

An English family of our acquaintance, who had settled at Aix, and who
wished to see company, imagined, naturally, that it would be necessary
to go through all the tedious process of preliminary introductions,
which are necessary in England. A French friend was consulted upon the
subject, and his advice was as simple as it was effectual: [52]"Donnez
un souper, cela fera courir tout le monde." Sometime after this,
happening to be conversing with the same gentleman upon this
subject:[53] "Soyez bien sur, Monsieur, (said he), que si le diable
donne a _souper, tout le monde soupera dans l'enfers_."

Versatility, that ruling feature in the French character, ought not to
be forgotten. They have of late been so accustomed to change, that
change has become not only natural, but, one would imagine, in some
measure necessary to their happiness. They change their leaders and
their sovereigns, with as much apparent ease as they do their fashions.
On the slightest new impulse, they change their thoughts, their oaths,
their love, their hatred. In this particular, a French mob is the most
remarkable thing in the world; they cannot exist without some favourite
yell, some particular watch-word of the day, or rather of the hour. One
day it is, [54]"_A bas le tyran! A bas les soldats!_" the next it is
"_Vive l'Empereur! Vivent les Marchaux! Vive l'armee!_" or it is, "_Vive
Louis le desire! Vive le fils de bon Henri!_" and in the next breath,
"_Vive le nation! Point de loix foedaux! Point des rois! Point de
noblesse!_" then, "_Point des droits reunis! Point de conscriptions!_"
and during the desolating aera of the revolution, their favourite cry
presented an exact picture of the character of the nation--of the same
nation, which, in these dark days of continual horror, could yet amuse,
itself by an exhibition of dancing-dogs, under the blood-dropping stage
of the guillotine; their cry was then, [55]"_Vive la Mort_!" Utterly
inattentive to these inconsistencies, the French people continue
willingly to cry out whatever rallying word may be given to them by
those agents who, working in secret, according to the ruling authorities
an