narrative of some royal lady who was nearly lost in a storm, and more than once we saw from the shore the waves “curling their monstrous heads.”
These beautiful waters, whose blue is unsurpassed, have inspired the muse of France. Lamartine has a poem, “Le Lac,” which is said to be a description of its beauties, but if his novel of “Raphael,” said to have been suggested by a cave on the lake, is not more interesting in prose than the “Lac” is in poetry, I suspect that the English reader will be disappointed.
To go from poetry to more material matters relating to the lake, those who love good eating will rejoice at finding at least thirty kinds of fish, several of which are excellent, and peculiar to Bourget. There are two or three kinds of trout, excellent large and small perch, different from the English kind: a small fresh-water sardine, nearly rivalling our whitebait: the omble (or “ombre”) chevalier, of which it is said Sir H. Davy used to be so fond, that his life was endangered more than once from an excess arising from an overmeal of this fish: there is also the lavaret, said to be peculiar to this lake, very excellent, and, as Mr. Disraeli christened a whiting “the chicken of the sea,” this may with equal justice be called the chicken of the lake. Henry the Third of France was so delighted with the lavaret, that he used to have them sent to him express to Paris. I myself know more than one gourmand who would think himself well repaid for the trouble of a journey to Aix, to be able to go through a course of the omble chevalier, the lavaret, the lake perch, and the fresh-water sardines.
While on the subject of eating, it may be well to mention that the Savoyards are good cooks, and in addition to the usual French dishes, their proximity to Italy has induced them to adopt some of the more popular dishes of northern Italy.
I have devoted some space to the important subject of fish, but I ought also to add, that the country abounds in all the usual kinds of game, as well as almost every variety of waterfowl, which are to be found in the lake and adjacent water-meadows. On referring to the different excursions which may be made, I find I have omitted one, the most important and most easily made, namely, that to Chambery, the capital of Savoy; the railway takes you there, along a charming road, in twenty-five minutes, for a few pence. You shop and see the fine old town and new streets, the castle, and chapel, where, by-the-bye, is some very beautiful 15th century stained glass, and are back at Aix with your purchases by half-past three, unless you are tempted to make further excursions in the country to either of the beautiful cascades, called severally that of the Bout du Monde and La Doria; or a pilgrimage to Les Charmettes, where lived Madame de Warrens, the mistress and lover of Rousseau. Who ever reads his account of this woman without horror and disgust, both as regards himself and her? Not denying his genius and the splendour of his language, who now has the courage and the patience to wade through his novels, or even to read his “Confessions,” except in pity, as the picture of an eloquent madman? Surely our taste as well as our morals must have improved of late. Who now could receive much pleasure from Miss Burney’s “Evelina?” and yet Johnson, Burke, Reynolds, Windham, &c., were enchanted by it, and seemed unable to think of any other book for the season. I should mention that Rousseau is said to have described some of the scenery of the lake in his novel, and that his opinion of the Savoyards corresponds with my own. He more than once mentions their “esprit riant” and kind disposition, adding, that having wandered through different states, he had found no people better than the Savoyards, and that he wished above all things that he could pass the remainder of his days amongst them.
Besides the Savoyard organ-grinders, whom the London police are continually bidding to “move on,” many of their brethren emigrate to Paris and other large towns and become chimney-sweepers, commissionaires, &c., sending home much of their hard earnings to their poorer families. In respectability as well as in other matters, they much resemble the travelling barometer-sellers from the Lake of Como and other parts of the North of Italy, and, like them, they return to their own country when they have gained a small competency.
Those who visit the Grande Chartreuse should extend their journey to the Val d’Isère and Grenoble; with Wickham and Cramer’s book for a guide the track of Hannibal may be traced, and Grenoble will more than repay the journey. Perhaps not even Inspruck is so gloriously situated; and, as Dr. Clarke said, that at the latter town “the wolves wandering in the overhanging mountains looked down into the streets,” so I felt, as I walked home from the opera at Grenoble one fine starry night, that more than one bear or wolf might be licking his lips at me from his lair.
As regards country and the excursions, I feel that I have said enough to tempt many to take the one long day’s railway from Paris, and spend a month at Aix, giving up Battle Abbeys, Fairlight Glens, Lovers’ Seats, and Devils’ Dykes for what must be newer and more beautiful.
CAMBRIDGE WRANGLERS.
There are newspaper devotees, who include the Mathematical Tripos in their January course, but no list of names has so little interest for the ruck of readers. Unless they “have a friend in,” what is it to them that Cambridge is about to send another eleven dozen of alumni into the world with honours and white fur hoods? They may glance at the name of the happy senior wrangler, but they have borne no part in the common-room and wine-party discussions for months before, as to whether St. John’s would again hold its own against Trinity, or a small-college man beat them both; and they have forgotten it, along with “The Wooden Spoons,” before they are two paragraphs a head. What are cosines, differential co-efficients, and the frustum of a cone to them? Making their accounts square is the simple equation of their bosoms now. XXX has superseded that little familiar x of their school-boy days (of which
