give but a glance from the window and hurry on. Yet an interesting
place in its way. Its bright main streets seem as gay and glittering
as those of Paris, with the additional air of snug provincial comfort.
To one accustomed for months to the solemn sobriety of our English
capital, with its work-a-day, not to say dingy look, nothing is more
exhilarating or gay than one of these first-class French provincial
towns, such as Marseilles, Bordeaux, or this Lille. There is a
glittering air of substantial opulence, with an attempt--and a
successful one--at fine boulevards and fine trees.

The approach to Lille recalled the protracted approach to some great
English manufacturing town, the tall chimneys flying by the
carriage-windows a good quarter of an hour before the town was
reached. A handsome, rich, and imposing city, though content to accept
a cast-off station from Paris, as a poor relative would accept a
cast-off suit of clothes. The fine façade was actually transported
here stone by stone, and a much more imposing one erected in its
place.

The prevailing one-horse tram-cars seem to suit the Flemish
associations. The Belgians have taken kindly and universally to them,
and find them to be 'exactly in their way.' The fat Flemish horse
ambles along lazily, his bells jingling. No matter how narrow or
winding the street, the car threads its way. The old burgher of the
Middle Ages might have relished it. The old disused town-hall is
quaint enough with its elaborately-carved _façade_, with a high double
roof and dormers, and a lantern surmounting all. A bit of true
'Low-Countries' work; but one often forgets that we are in French
Flanders. Entertaining hours could be spent here with profit, simply
in wandering from spot to spot, eschewing the 'town valet' and