The Youth here don’t seem to be so hair-brain’d as they are elsewhere: I don’t know whether they are really wiser, but however they seem to be so in Public. Were I to advise a Father of a Family, it should be to send his Children to the University here, than which I question whether there’s a better in Europe, as well with regard to the Masters of the Exercises, as to the Care taken of the Youth, who are boarded, dieted and instructed in all the Sciences and Exercises, and divided into two Classes; of which the one only studies the Law, and therefore does not pay so much as the other; but they must be all Gentlemen. They are only allow’d to go abroad on certain Days of the Week; but then they may appear at Court, and go where they please, except to Houses of Gaming.
The Out-parts of Turin are infinitely pleasant. The Country is adorned with a great many pretty Cassines or Pleasure-Houses, which are only separated by Meadows, that are constantly water’d by a Number of little Brooks. I take the Air every Day upon the Esplanade, between the City and the Citadel, where there are fine Walks, and one often meets with very pretty Women. The Blood here is perfectly good, and all the Piedmontese Ladies have a great deal of Life and Spirit. I am very sorry to leave them, but the Misfortune is unavoidable, and Haste presses me to be gone. I propose to be in ten or twelve Days at Lyons, if I don’t stay at Chamberry; but this you will know by my next Letter. Don’t fail to write to me at Paris, and believe me to be, &c.
LETTER XXXVII.
SIR,Lyons, March 2, 1732.
Tho’ I had pass’d Mount Cenis twice before, and travers’d Savoy, yet I thought the Passage of the Alps as disagreeable as ever; and am heartily glad to find myself in this City, which is better than all Savoy put together.
From Turin I went and lay at la Novalaise. I first pass’d by the Castle of Rivoli, which stands on an Eminence, and to which there’s an Avenue from Turin in a strait Line of three Leagues in Length. Then I travell’d thro’ Susa, which, by the way, is a very dirty Town, upon the Banks
of a River form’d by Torrents from the neighbouring Mountains, which seem, as it were, to bury Susa alive. This City, and the Valley in which ’tis built, are commanded by the Fort de la Brunette, an important Place, which King Victor Amedeus caus’d to be erected for the Defence of Piedmont. Nature and Art have alike contributed to fortify it. ’Tis provided with a good Garison, and all Necessaries to sustain a Siege; and if it had been built in the Time of Lewis XIII. I doubt whether that King, and his Minister the Cardinal de Richelieu, would so easily have passed the Mountains.