health, good spirits, and fine weather, are wonderful travelling
companions, and render one tolerably independent of the charms of
scenery. Every mile that separated me from Calais, and took away the
chance of being overtaken, added to my gaiety, and I flatter myself that
a happier party have rarely travelled that well frequented road.

We reached Abbeville to dinner, and adjourned to the beautiful little
garden of the inn for our coffee; the evening was so delightful that I
proposed to walk on the Paris road, until the coming up of the carriage,
which required a screw, or a washer, or some such trifle as always occurs
in French posting. To this la chere mamma objected, she being tired, but
added, that Isabella and I might go on, and that she would take us up in
half an hour. This was an arrangement so very agreeable and unlooked for
by me, that I pressed Miss Bingham as far as I well could, and at last
succeeded in overcoming her scruples, and permitting me to shawl her.
One has always a tremendous power of argument with the uninitiated
abroad, by a reference to a standard of manners and habits totally
different from our own. Thus the talismanic words--"Oh! don't be
shocked; remember you are in France," did more to satisfy my young
friend's mind than all I could have said for an hour. Little did she
know that in England only, has an unmarried young lady any liberty, and
that the standard of foreign propriety on this head is far, very far more
rigid than our own.

"La premiere Rue a gauche," said an old man of whom I inquired the road;
"et puis," added I.

"And then quite straight; it is a chaussee all the way, and you cannot
mistake it."