Lillers, Hotel de la Poste, July 10th.
A fine avenue, leaving St. Omer; and a rather more interesting country, through which flows the little river. One hill in the distance (which we took for Cassel) breaking the flat, and here and there, some rather pretty looking hamlets—each cabin within its prairie; but between these no sign of habitation. The light sandy soil is extremely cultivated, and the unending plain less sad now than it will be later in the season, as the corn is in ear, and the bean and poppy fields are in blossom. From the seed of this purple and white poppy is expressed salad oil. Aire, which we passed through, is a picturesque, fortified town, its ramparts shaded with fine green trees. Beyond Aire, on each side of the grand route, are numberless gardens, and it was gay and sweet with flowers.
At every mile we pass a “petite chapelle,” being usually a small wooden case with a glass door, perched on a pole, planted at the road-side; and within, a tiny figure of the virgin, attired in white muslin. I saw Nôtre Dame de Grâce, Nôtre Dame de Guerison, and Nôtre Dame de Bonne Fin; the last with no great pleasure, thinking she might be there installed on account of the arrival of the black fever, which is in Flanders. We fancied the villagers looked pale, and passed at a gallop.
John had arrived before us at Lillers; and fearing the diligence had taken him too far, and unable to ask the name of the place in which he was deposited, he locked up our baggage in a room of the inn, and, with the great key in his hand, was contemplating a walk back to St. Omer. This inn is a mere farm-house with bad accommodation; the landlord and his friends sat smoking in the room where we dined; he regrets we will not walk three quarters of a league to the fête, and the servant and the landlady’s daughter are now describing Dominique’s dancing, and a minute ago had nearly come to high words about Dominique.
St. Pol, July 11th.
Started in burning weather, having found no conveyance for John, who trudged after cheerfully, though he says “it is these straight roads what breaks the heart of a traveller.” Stopped to rest whenever the shade of a bush made it possible, for the fine trees which grew here as well as on most of the grandes routes of France are all felled. Saw no traveller, excepting a white haired bishop, in his purple robes, who passed in his carriage. John said “he would have kneeled to ax a blessing but he took him for an officer;” at last we came up with a petite voiture, within which we deposited John, who directly commenced a conversation no one was likely to sustain. Arrived here ourselves, having suffered a good deal from the intense heat; and drank some beer which a peasant sold at four sous a quart, and explained to her how I sat on Fanny having no one behind to hold me on. Avoid this inn on pain of bad meat, and bad beds, and mistakes in the bill. Strolled out, for refreshment, in the heavy dew, and finding a rather pretty walk compared to the frightful plain, hailed as if it had been Swiss scenery the dry bed of a little stream with a bridge and broken bank, shaded by young birch trees, and a path winding upwards from it through corn and bean fields and a tiny copse to the town.
Doullens, le Grand Turc, July 12th.
Left St. Pol at four in the afternoon, to avoid the heat, and found it still so excessive that we sat under the shade of the first trees we found, and let the horses feed until the sun declined. John was to follow in the “Service des Dépêches,” a heavy cab with a raw-boned horse. The peasantry hereabouts are worse lodged and more filthy than between Calais and St. Omer. Woe to whom penetrate within the prairie, or step across the floor. The evening grew dark so suddenly that we had some trouble in finding (not the road, for there are no cross-ways or green lanes) but its least stony part, in the steep rough descent to Doullens; took a poppy field for a lake; it struck ten as we arrived in the bad air of the narrow street, where reigns the Grand Turk the moon rising as our ride ended. John appeared in the mail a few minutes after; it had changed horses on the road, but certainly not fatigued either, for ours were not put out of a walk. The fille d’auberge blinded me by holding her candle in my face to examine hat, habit, and wearer, before she thought proper to lead the way to a room. The atmosphere abominable, and the draught which, when I threw open the windows, came in from the narrow street and dirty yard, worse than the air it expelled. Nothing to be had but café au lait and cherries, but the beds comfortable and the dark-eyed bonne good humoured. She swept the room before breakfast this morning, and the floor bore witness to its being a favour.
We walked to the citadel, which is just without the town, now occupied by only twenty-five men; a pretty avenue leads to it up the glacis. We were admitted without difficulty, though with some formality. The soldier at the gate summoned the Corporal; the Corporal asked permission of the Commandant, and returned to conduct us across the two drawbridges. The form of the citadel is a square, flanked at each angle by a bastion, and defended by outworks. From his manners and conversation, the Corporal might have been a nobleman—for he had perfect ease and no familiarity; he offered his hand to assist me in climbing where it was rough and steep, but only when assistance was necessary. On the side of the citadel furthest from the town is the place where political offenders were confined some years back; it is a fort within a fort, and has its own defences. The rampart commands it, and its sentinel kept a constant look out, yet, in spite of all precautions, some escaped. They were retaken, but unpunished, Louis Philip having shortly after proclaimed his “general amnesty.” Subterranean passages opening from this citadel conduct to the town, and completely mine it. The heat was so intense that we could not make the entire tour, though it was only eleven o’clock; the Corporal regretted being deprived of the pleasure of accompanying us further, and accepted the silver put in his hand without looking at it, and with seeming reluctance, as a physician does his first fee.
Doullens has belonged to many masters: to the Huguenots during the wars of religion, then to their enemies, afterwards to the Spaniards, who took it when Henry the Fourth was yet unsettled on his throne. It was in 1595, and the surprise of Amiens, which took place two years after, was accomplished by the governor of Doullens’ love for a fair widow. The governor was the famous Captain Hernand Teillo, and the lady the Dame de Monchy, who was rich as well as noble and beautiful. “I was born at Amiens,” she replied proudly, when he besought her to accept his hand: “I will espouse no man unless we obey the same royal master; either abandon the King of Spain and become French as I am, or take Amiens and make me a Spanish subject.”