Free Daily Life During the French Revolution by James M. Anderson Page B

seats, and glass windows, was pulled by six horses and was often
employed for long-distance travel, along with the six-horse diligence, a
kind of stagecoach with room for passengers and goods, which traveled at about
six miles per hour.
    Some coaches were built for speed with space for
merchandise and dispatches as well as a few passengers. Others were
exceptionally sturdy and built to carry heavy loads of merchandise, such as the fourgon. The trip from Calais to Paris by fourgon took six days;
by diligence, the travel time was two and a half days. How much a person
was willing to spend decided on the manner of travel. The mail coaches, solid
but elegant with a high chassis, windows, was pulled by four to six horses; it
also took people and would make unscheduled stops along the route to pick up or
discharge passengers. Anyone interested in taking a trip could go to the
offices of the conveyer or look through the divers announcements in the
newspapers:
     
    NOTICE
     
    Proposed
Voyage Monday, the 7th of this month, at 7.00 P.M. precisely, a superb berline
with 8 new and solid seats, will be leaving Paris. Travellers are invited to
come and see it at the following address: M. Rebut, manufacturer of soft
drinks, rue Saint Denis, at the corner of rue Aux Ours. This berline can
transport all luggage, packages, trunks, effects and other important things as
well as the travellers, at the price set by the National Assembly. It is going
to Angers; the driver will do all that is expected of him to take travellers
who would like to go on to Nantes in a comfortable manner and at the lowest
possible price.
    CP 3 May, 1792.
     
     
    INNS
     
    Tobias George Smollett arrived in Boulogne in June 1763 and
proceeded to Paris on his way to the Mediterranean coast. Frustrated by the
insolence of coachmen, he launched into a diatribe on the inconveniences of the
road, complaining that in France
     
    if
you are retarded by any accident, you cannot in many parts of the kingdom find
a lodging, without perhaps travelling two or three posts farther than you would
choose to go, to the prejudice of your health, and even the hazard of your
life, whereas, on any part of the post-road in England, you will meet with
tolerable accommodation at every stage.
     
    Having crossed France on his way to visit the Pyrenees Mountains
along the Spanish border, with the town of Luchon his ultimate destination,
Arthur Young also compared the lodgings he stayed in with those of England. He
found some French inns better than the English ones in two respects: the food
and drink were superior in France, and the prices cheaper. Otherwise, he
complained:
     
    they
roast every thing to a chip, if they are not cautioned: but they give such a
number and variety of dishes that if you do not like some, there are others to
please your palate. . . . We sometimes have met with bad wine, but upon the
whole, far better than such port as English inns give.
     
    He goes on to say that in the
French inns, there was
     
    no
parlour to eat in; only the room with two, three, or four beds. Apartments
badly fitted up; the walls white-washed; or paper of different sorts in the
same room; or tapestry so old, as to be a fit nidus for moths and spiders; and
the furniture such that an English innkeeper would light his fire with it. For
a table, you have everywhere a board laid on cross bars, which are so
conveniently contrived, as to leave room for your legs only at the end.—Oak
chairs with rush bottoms, and the back universally a direct perpendicular, that
defies all idea of rest after fatigue. Doors give music as well as entrance;
the wind whistles through their chinks; and hinges grate discord. Windows admit
rain as well as light; when shut they are not so easy to open; and when open
not easy to shut.
     
    Other comments include,
     
    Mops,
brooms, and scrubbing-brushes are not in the catalogue of the necessaries of a
French inn. Bells there are none; the fille must always be bawled for;
and