While my disembodied spirit To that high and laurel'd choir. A PEEP INTO DIEPPE. "Usually speaking, the worst bred person in company is a young traveller just returned from abroad." SWIFT. POETS are not bound to be very accurate topographists, or Voltaire might have been asked upon what authority he described Dieppe as a happy port in the following lines of Henriade : À travers deux rochers où la mer mugissante Vient briser en courroux son onde blanchissante, for unless he means that the worthy monarch was happy to find any port in a storm, or that the town was happy in the possession of its king, the epithet is singularly misapplied. A huge mass of shingle has so nearly blocked up the mouth of the harbour, that even the fishing vessels of the place occasionally miss the narrow channel of its entrance—an occurrence which would still oftener happen, but that they are usually towed in by ropes thrown to them from the head of the jetty. Nothing is seen of the town on approaching it from the sea, its position being only indicated by a break in the long ribbon of cliff that fringes the horizon, le Phare de Falaise, or the Cliff Light-house, is the principal object on the right of the coast; while on the left, a good glass may enable you to discover the mounds of Cæsar's camp, which, on inspection, will be found to exhibit nearly the same characteristics as its namesake on the opposite coast, in the neighbourhood of Worthing, although of much larger dimensions. On passing the jetty, the first object is the Sailor's Cross, with a huge figure of our Saviour high in the air, and the Virgin gazing up at him from beneath, at whose base it is not unusual to behold one or two women, especially if it be blowing weather, kneeling and putting up vows for some sea-faring relative. The next building is the house of Jean Bouzard, surnamed Le Brave-homme, who, for his devotement and humanity in rescuing a number of shipwrecked sailors, was presented to Louis XVI., when the monarch ordered this residence to be built for him upon the spot where he had thus signalised his courage. At a little distance are the blackened ruins of La Tour-aux-Crabes, so called from the number of those shellfish attached to its b, where it was formerly washed by the sea. In the archives of Dieppe, this tower is rendered memorable by its obstinate resistance in 1442 and 3 to the English army, commanded by Talbot himself, who was finally repulsed with great loss; and it is curious to contrast its present forlorn, solitary, and mouldering turrets, surmounted perhaps by two or three gaping descendents of the English who thus assailed it, with the crowd of eager faces whose brandished weapons then flashed from its solid ramparts, and the clash and clamour of the contending armies. The traveller now finds himself in a spacious harbour, around which the town is built, occupying the entrance to the beautiful valley of Arques, and shut in on either side by lofty perpendicular cliffs. Dieppe was utterly destroyed in 1694 by the English, who, in the space of 24 hours, threw into it 3000 bombs and 4000 balls, so that it has no antiquities to boast, with the exception of its two churches, its fortifications, and about a hundred wooden built houses, which seem to be waiting for an excuse to tumble down. One of the first buildings upon the quay is the Morgue, ready to receive the victims of the element on whose borders it stands, and affording a melancholy evidence of the dangers attending the fisherman's trade. Against its wall is the following notice-"On previent le public que ceux qui viendront reclamer ou reconnaître les individus n'auront rien à payer," an equally strong testimony of the general poverty, since the parties who are thus invited gratis to recognise the bodies become answerable for the expense of their interment, which would otherwise fall upon the thrifty municipality of the town. Fishermen in France seem to work harder, encounter more peril, and be worse remunerated, than any other class of its inhabitants-an assertion of which Dieppe will supply abundant confirmation. The agriculture of the sea, as it has been somewhat bullishly termed, appears to give an grateful return to those who plough the bosom of the deep. It is true that they require little capital, they have a right of free warren over the liquid fields of Neptune, no rent to pay, no seed to sow; what they gain, (apologising for the inevitable pun,) is net profit, and they can lose nothing but their lives, a trifling accident which is very apt to interfere with their industry. But after all, it may be asked, What is such an existence worth? when the sea engulphs them, it is not so much depriving them of life, as making them a present of death; a trim reckoning, as Falstaff would say; yet the happy rogues seem quite insensible of any peculiar hardship in their fate, and Dieppe is at once the poorest, the most miserable looking, and the cheerfullest place which I have encountered in France. Industrious as bees, the women, like those indefatigable insects, lighten their labour with a song; while the men, when not upon active service, enjoy the "otium cum dignitate" over a pipe of tobacco, assist their wives and daughters in mending nets, or suddenly strike up a chorus and join in a family dance. Another proof is thus afforded of the general system of compensations, which, throwing a weight of ennui upon the rich, who are relieved from every other burthen, generally makes those the lightest-hearted who appear to be the most heavily laden. Charlemagne built the first fort upon the Western Cliff, called Bertheville, which was the name of the town until the establishment of the Normans in Neustria. The present château is of the thirteenth century, and by no means unpicturesque, either in its architecture or situation, especially on the land side. There is but one church deserving attention, that of St. Jacques, whose lofty square Gothic tower, constructed in the fifteenth century, as some say by the English, though other authorities assert that nothing but the stone was brought from the opposite coast, is very handsome and in good preservation. In the interior, as usual in the sea ports of Catholic countries, various models of different sized ships hang suspended from the roof, the votive offerings of sailors, who have doubtless attributed their escape from shipwreck to the temptation thus held out. It would appear that the Virgin is deemed particularly accessible to this species of bribery, since the chapel dedicated "Reginæ Cali" exhibited the greatest number of these maritime presentations. The practice, as well as the inscription, forcibly recall the Pagan times, and it must be a comfort to sea-faring people, who have such frequent occasion for the special interference of the "Queen of Heaven," to believe in the possibility of propitiating her by the lure of these nautical toys. Religious ordinances are scrupulously observed at Dieppe; on the sabbath and the saint's days every vessel hoists its white flag, processions are seen in the streets, hymns are chaunted in the open air, garlands are hung from house to house, some of the inhabitants are even so much in earnest as to shut up their shops! It was the fête-dieu during our short stay (the very name a profanation!) and the whole priesthood and population of the place were out in grand procession, stopping at every Reposoir, (a temporary platform covered with white linen, and profusely decorated with tin, tinsel, and trumpery,) to go through the whole pantomimic mummery of Catholic forms, the officer of the military guard who accompanied them shouting out the word of command when the ringing of the bell announced the elevation of the host, and the soldiers, as well as the whole assemblage, falling simultaneously upon one knee at the signal. According to our notions, there is something impious in the very piety of the Catholics, and few protestants could read without being startled, the name of one of the streets in Dieppe-"La Rue Grand-DieuVivant!!" At this moment the most fashionable colour in Paris is" la couleur du Saint Esprit !". Amid the objects deserving attention in the vicinity of Dieppe, the Chateau d'Arques stands preeminent, not only for the beauty of its site, on a bold precipitous elevation commanding beautiful views of the valley, but for the historical recollections it suggests. Its remains in other respects present the customary features of these ancient fortresses-square and round towers crumbling into one common confusion, a lofty keep enclosing a well of fearful and dizzy depth, and a wide surrounding ditch, in which the buttresses of the drawbridges are still standing. Its first construction is attributed to the Romans, and here and there some tiles are seen which become dignified by the possibility of their classic origin; but the greater portion of the ruins is of rubble-work, or of brick-a common-place ingredient incapable of any lofty association. A genuine Babylonian brick, indeed, with an inscription in the Persepolitan character, has its |
