[55] Oddly enough--if M. Barbeau's index is to be trusted, and
it is an unusually good one,--he makes no reference to Evelyn's visit to
Bath. But Evelyn went there in June, 1654, bathed in the Cross Bath,
criticised the "_facciata_" of the Abbey Church, complained of the
"narrow, uneven and unpleasant streets," and inter-visited with the
company frequenting the place for health. "Among the rest of the idle
diversions of the town," he says, "one musician was famous for acting a
changeling [idiot or half-wit], which indeed he personated strangely."
(_Diary_, Globe edn., 1908, p. 174.)


But it is needless to prolong analysis. One's only wonder--as usual
after the event--is that what has been done so well had never been
thought of before. For while M. Barbeau is to be congratulated upon the
happy task he has undertaken, we may also congratulate ourselves that he
has performed it so effectively. His material is admirably arranged. He
has supported it by copious notes; and he has backed it up by an
impressive bibliography of authorities ancient and modern. This is
something; but it is not all[56]. He has done much more than this. He has
contrived that, in his picturesque and learned pages, the old "Queen of
the West" shall live again, with its circling terraces, its grey stone
houses and ill-paved streets, its crush of chairs and chariots, its
throng of smirking, self-satisfied prom-enaders.

Note:

[56] To the English version (Heinemann, 1904) an eighteenth-century map
of Bath, and a number of interesting views and portraits have been added.