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LYONS.

I was at Vienne in Dauphiny when I projected the excursion which is the subject of the fol-lowing pages; and with an earnest desire of attentively exploring a celebrated portion of theA trite Alpes , I set out, as soon as 1 had prepared matters for my journey, towards Lyons , wherethe valley of the Rhone gradually widens, and the secondary mountains of the Alps and Vivares,which screen it on both sides, diverge in an equal proportion, and leave the course of that beauti-ful river to be traced by a succession of fertile and well-cultivated hills, each seeming to surpassthe other in vegetation.

This superb amphitheatre is covered alternately by meadows and vineyards, where the luxu-riant branches hang negligently from the trees, which consist chiefly of apple, plum, cherry, &c.;through which a variety of elegant villas, and neatly-looking cottages, peeping between theirvariegated tufts, serve, when combined with the pellucid waters of the Rhone, and the variousmajanderings or windings of its course, greatly to enrich the prospect, and render the scene highlypicturesque.

The situation, therefore, of Lyons, in the middle of such a fertile country, and at the con-fluence of the two rivers, the Rhone and the Saone , must surely be, in many respects, a trulyenviable spot, and such as is peculiarly adapted to the establishment of an inland commercialtown : for those two great rivers, after having separately watered, and by their sediments manuredand fertilised, the different provinces through which they flow, unite at the southern extremity ofthe city, as if to encourage and stimulate by that union the industry and activity of fhe inhabi-tants, and serve as a channel for the easy and extensive conveyance of the several articles of thatastonishing trade which for years characterised that beautiful city.

Lyons, or Lugdmium Segusianorum, or Celtarurn, is one of the most ancient towns in France ,and was, after Paris , the most magnificent, prior to the revolution. It appears to have existedlong before the conquest of Gaul by the Romans, as the capital of an extensive kingdom, ofwhich the Saone and the Rhone were the limits, and which formed that kind of delta describedby Polybius , chap. 10, as being the place where Hannibal met the two brothers contending for thekingdom of the Allobroges; who, having granted succours or assistance to the eldest, Brancus(according to Livy), obtained the object he had in view, to facilitate his passage into Italy acrossthe Alps . '

In the-time of the Romans it is supposed to have formed one of the principal cities of GalliaCeltica, or Lugdunensis prinm. The emperor Augustus , and afterwards Nero , are said to havecontributed greatly towards its aggrandizement and embellishment. It is even asserted, thatAugustus made it for a short time his place of residence. And, according to some authors, itboasts of having been the native city of Marcus Aurelius , and of Claudius Nero , son to Drusus .Suetonius , the historian , in his life of Caligula, speaks of the gymnasium, or academy, at Lyons ,for the discussion of Greek and Latin subjects, on the same plan of that formerly at Athens: andthe abbe Expelli, in his Dictionary of the Gauls , says, that the monastery of Aney, now known,by the name of Monasterium Athenense, is built on the spot where that academy once stood.

There are few cities in France which have experienced, at distant epochas, such calamitiesas Lyons, having not only suffered by revolutions in various shapes, but been ravaged at differentperiods by the successive inroads of barbarous hordes, who, after the decline of the Roman em-pire, made frequent incursions into Gaul ; so that few vestiges remain of its ancient magnificence;although sufficient to convey to a contemplative mind serious reflexions on the sad vicissitudesand reverses to which human affairs are liable. These vestiges chiefly consist in the scatteredremains of a Roman palace, theatre, public baths, &c.; the greatest part of which are still buriedorconcealed in the rubbish or loose fragments of the mountains of Goneviilre. It is therefore noimprobable idea, that the ancient city of Lyons , or Lugdunum, which derives its appellation fromLncii dunam, or mount of Lucius, dunum being Celtic for a mountain, originally stood on thedeclivity of the mountain; a conjecture which appears still more forcibly confirmed by the ex-

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