CONTINUATION Of UYONS.

DEPARTURE FROM THAT CITY.

Though the plan of the present work does not require me to enter into a regular and minutedetail of the various objects meriting notice, to be found in the cities, towns, and villages,included within the line of my projected route, yet I cannot prevail on myself entirely to passover those things which persons who travel for information ought to explore. With the philosophic .observations contained in this tour I wish to blend something of a lighter kind. Perhaps,^ afterthis explanation and apology, I may be allowed to proceed to a general description of Lyons—a city which cannot be surveyed without exciting admiration, and which travellers haverepeatedly praised.

Its quays and wharfs in particular must arrest attention; for as the major part of the city isbuilt between the Saone and the Rhone (rivers which are both navigable for miles previous to theirjunction), these public works, for beauty, execution, and high preservation, not only equal, butsurpass, I may venture to assert, most of the kind in Europe . It is likewise impossible for meto speak too highly of those constructed on the Rhone, deemed chefs-d’oeuvres in their line, andas much admired for the perfection of their workmanship (which being of free-stone, givesthem a noble and cleanly appearance) as for their regularity and extent, most of them beingone hundred feet in width, and the whole extending from four to five miles in length, includingthe works on the Perrache # . .

These quays are almost every where in a straight line, and the greatest part of those situatedon the new bed of the Rhone are shaded by an avenue of trees on each side of the terre-plein,which serves as a delightful promenade for the inhabitants. The stones with which these quaysare built, were brought from Savoy, a distance not less than forty miles; a circumstance whichmust have mad6 them works of great labour and expense.

The various bridges which are thrown across the Rhone and the Saone have a go'od effect; thewooden ones in particular are worth notice, from their singular construction, and boldness ofexecution. The one which leads to the village of Broteaux, .on the left bank of the Rhone, isparticularly so. The stone bridge, La Guillotihre, although of ancient date, is still handsome,and makes a noble appearance. It consists of twenty arches; and instead of being built in astraight line over the river, describes a kind of curve, which; like that of St. Esprit, forms aconvexity to oppose the current, and doubtless for a similar reason, the bend being certainly bettercalculated to resist the force of the Rhone, which is here excessively rapid. In the centre of thesame bridge stands a square tower, the gates of which are shut every night at the same hour.Ihis tower originally served as the limit betwixt the Dauphinfi and Lyonese provinces.

Among the public edifices which adorn this great city, are the hospitals and maisons de charit6:they are-of vast extent, and display much elegance of external symmetry. The Hotel Dieu inparticular, which is built on the quay contiguous to the Rhone, presents to the eye a completepiece of architecture, the pediment and cupola being of a most excellent taste.

« I cannot here pass over in silence the sentiment which affected me at the time, and which Ithink must naturally be felt by every philanthropist, when he sees objects, which, from their out-ward splendor, are too often apt to give us an exalted idea of the grandeur and pleasure of life;but when viewed in a different light, and we are led, by a long train of inscriptions and emble-matical devices, to regard them as pompous and beautiful outsides, including the sufferings of

* A part of the city which stands at the extremity of the Delta , noticed by Polybius, which takes its name from an in-dividual, who, about thirty years ago, undertook to build a new town on what had till then been only a swampy unwholesometract of land ; a plan which would doubtless have succeeded, and done infinite honour to its ingenious promoter (several of thehouses being already completed in 1780), had not the trade of that great commercial city been soon after totally annihilatedby the unfortunate causes before stated, which occasioned, for a time, the buildings to be delayed, and at last entirely sus-pended. The mills situated on the same spot, contiguous to the junction of the Saone and the Rhone, are likewise worth see-ing, on account of their curious construction.

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