Oct. 25.
I have diſcontinued my journal for three days to attend my friend, Mad. de ____, who has been ill. Uneaſineſs, and want of air and exerciſe, had brought on a little fever, which, by the uſual mode of treatment in thiſ country, has been conſiderably increaſed. Her diſorder did not indeed much alarm me, but I cannot ſay as much of her medical aſſiſtants, and it ſeems to me to be almoſt ſupernatural that ſhe has eſcaped the jeopardy of their preſcriptions. In my own illneſs I had truſted to nature, and my recollection of what had been ordered me on ſimilar occaſions; but for Mad. de ____ I was leſs confident, and deſirous of having better advice, begged a phyſician might be immediately ſent for. Had her diſorder been an apoplexy, ſhe muſt infallibly have died, for as no perſon, not even the faculty, can enter, without an order from the municipal Divan, half a day elapſed before this order could be procured. At length the phyſician and ſurgeon arrived, and I know not why the learned profeſſions ſhould impoſe on us more by one exterior than another; but I own, when I ſaw the phyſician appear in a white camblet coat, lined with roſe colour, and the ſurgeon with dirty linen, and a gold button and loop to his hat, I began to tremble for my friend. My feminine prejudices did not, however, in this inſtance, deceive me. After the uſual queſtions, the patient waſ declared in a fever, and condemned to cathartics, bleeding, and "bon bouillons;" that is to ſay, greaſy beef ſoup, in which there is never an oeconomy of onions.—When they were departed, I could not help expreſſing my ſurprize that people's lives ſhould be entruſted to ſuch hands, obſerving, at the ſame time, to the Baron de L____, (who is lodged in the ſame apartment with Mad. de ____,) that the French muſt never expect men, whoſe education fitted them for the profeſſion, would become phyſicians, while they continued to be paid at the rate of twenty-pence per viſit.— Yet, replied the Baron, if they make twenty viſits a day, they gain forty livreſ—"et c'eſt de quoi vivre." [It is a living.] It is undeniably de quoi vivre, but as long as a mere ſubſiſtence is the only proſpect of a phyſician, the French muſt be content to have their fevers cured by "draſtics, phlebotomy, and beef ſoup."
They tell me we have now more than five hundred detenus in this ſingle houſe. How ſo many have been wedged in I can ſcarcely conceive, but it ſeems our keeper has the art of calculating with great nicety the ſpace requiſite for a given number of bodies, and their being able to reſpire freely is not his affair. Thoſe who can afford it have their dinners, with all the appurtenances, brought from the inns or traiteurs; and the poor cook, ſleep, and eat, by ſcores, in the ſame room. I have perſuaded my friend to ſup as I do, upon tea; but our aſſociates, for the moſt part, finding it inconvenient to have ſuppers brought at night, and being unwilling to ſubmit to the ſame privations, regale themſelves with the remains of their dinner, re-cooked in their apartments, and thus go to ſleep, amidſt the fumes of perdrix a l'onion, oeufs a la tripe, [Partridge a l'onion—eggs a la tripe.] and all the produce of a French kitchen.
It is not, as you may imagine, the Bourgeois, and leſs diſtinguiſhed priſoners only, who indulge in theſe highly-ſeaſoned repaſts, at the expence of inhaling the ſavoury atmoſphere they leave behind them: the beaux and petites miſtreſſes, among the ci-devant, have not leſs exigent appetites, nor more delicate nerves; and the ragout is produced at night, in ſpite of the odours and diſorder that remain till the morrow.
I conclude, notwithſtanding your Engliſh prejudices, that there iſ nothing unwholeſome in filth, for if it were otherwiſe, I cannot account for our being alive. Five hundred bodies, in a ſtate of coacervation, without even a preference for cleanlineſs, "think of that Maſter Brook." All the forenoon the court is a receptacle for cabbage leaves, fiſh ſcales, leeks, &c. &c.—and as a French chambermaid uſually prefers the direct road to circumambulation, the refuſe of the kitchen is then waſhed away by plentiful inundations from the dreſſing-room—the paſſages are blockaded by foul plates, fragments, and bones; to which if you add the ſmell exhaling from hoarded apples and gruyere cheeſe, you may form ſome notion of the ſufferings of thoſe whoſe olfactory nerves are not robuſt. Yet this is not all—nearly every female in the houſe, except myſelf, iſ accompanied even here by her lap-dog, who ſleeps in her room, and, not unfrequently, on her bed; and theſe Leſbias and Lindamiras increaſe the inſalubrity of the air, and colonize one's ſtockings by ſending forth daily emigrations of fleas. For my own part, a few cloſe November dayſ will make me as captious and ſplenetic as Matthew Bramble himſelf. Nothing keeps me in tolerable good humour at preſent, but a clear froſty morning, or a high wind.