Page:Rambles in Germany and Italy in 1840, 1842, and 1843 - Volume 1.djvu/168

 of equality of means and privileges. I will hope not: for on that hope is built every endeavour to banish ignorance, and hard labour and penury, from political society.

This is a long digression: but I have not much more to say. We arrived in Lyons at half-past three in the morning, and with difficulty got admitted into an hotel. The system of French hotels has no resemblance to that of the Swiss; and you must conclude from this, that they do not emulate them in activity, order, and comfort. I was bound for Paris; and proceeded by the steamer, up the Seine, to Chalons. On board these long, narrow, river steamers, I found the same defects—the air, most agreeable to a traveller, of neatness, and civility, was absent. There is, however, no real fault to be found, and I should not mention this were it not a change; and I sincerely wish the French would return to what they once were, and give us all lessons of pleasing manners, instead of imitating and exaggerating our faults, and adding to them an impress all their own—a sort of fierceness when displeased, which is more startling than our sullenness. As I said, this has no reference to any act towards myself; but the winning tone and manner that had pleased me of old no longer appeared, and it was in the phraseology used among each other that the change was most remarkable.