Generally speaking, the prisons of the south of France are filled with prisoners for political offences, or rather for political opinions, and at Grenoble, the criminal tribunal is declared permanent. Yet, if the French are not attached to the present government, it does not appear that they have, in general, any aversion to it. They do not love Napoleon, but their dislike is deeply mixed with regret for the splendour and glory of his reign. They do not trouble their heads about young Napoleon, yet if he should prove a man of any talents, and the Bourbons should take any measures to excite alarm concerning the national property, it is probably to him they would look, because there is no other, whose claim would be readily admitted by the party opposed to the present system. With the exception of some men of talents, who wish to open that career of honourable ambition, which a popular government admits more than any other, I do not think they have any inclination for a second experiment of a republic. I hope Louis XVIII. will live eight or ten years longer at least, for I think it would give a chance, I fear the only chance, the French have for a constitution, round which they will generally rally against either anarchy or despotism. If the feeling is once[24] fully called forth, they will soon improve their government; it may be an indifferent constitution at present, but such a union will gradually make it a good one, and I think it would be no small advantage to our own, to have liberty well understood and acted upon in a great neighbouring state. We submit to many inconveniences, and many abuses, because we fancy them inseparable from what we love and admire; if France were free, the difference of her prejudices and manners would show us the road in many instances, as we show it to her in others.
GENEVA was very full, and the difficulty of finding a lodging drove me to a little inn, called the Hotel des Trois Maures, where I had a good chamber, and nothing else good. The first, to me, was an important advantage, as I wanted to revise the sketches and memoranda of the south of France, before the subject had faded from my recollection. In fact, I wished to disburthen my mind entirely, and transfer it to paper; which was a great relief, for I felt a continual anxiety lest any thing should escape me after having once been observed. On the 17th of August I walked to Cologni, where our friend, Mr. W., has taken up his abode; he has a beautiful spot; his grounds command, on one side, the Lake of Geneva and the distant range of Jura; on the other, a rich valley opens towards the Môle, a fine conical mountain, rising 4,800 feet above the lake; the Brezon, with its ragged summit crowning the hanging woods which creep up its sides; and beyond all, the brilliant summit of Mont Blanc.