CHAPTER IV.

LOUVAIN-TIRLEMONT-ST. TRON-LIEGE.

WE were early on the road to Liége, our route lying through the towns of Louvain, Tirlemont, and St. Tron. Passed along the boulevards of Brussels, and emerged into the same open expanse of cultivated country we had passed through in coming from Ostend. The absence of hedges and trees renders this description of country any thing but picturesque.

At Louvain we breakfasted, and a miserable affair it was. If I say but little of this fine old

town it is because I know but little of it: there are several things, however, which it would be heresy to omit. The Hôtel de Ville is one of the most beautiful Gothic buildings extant. The town walls

are one league and a half in circuit, and formerly enclosed 200,000 people: now, the population does not exceed 20,000. The white beer of Louvain is celebrated among European gourmands: the breweries are still forty in number. Besides the consumption of the town itself, 150,000 tuns are annually exported. The high houses of Louvain are antique in appearance; and with the town altogether we were pleased.

With six stout long-tailed Flemish horses yoked to our diligence, we hied on our way through a rich country, well farmed.

Tirlemont is a good town, but, from what we ascertained, its trade is but a shadow of what it was. There are two fine churches, miserably disfigured, by having small houses built against them. We were told that the services of one of them were performed by married canons, who bear the name of cot-queens or woman-priests. They certainly are the wisest catholic priests I ever heard of. At Tirlemont, we purchased twelve fine green-gages at a stall for less than an English halfpenny; one pound of filberts cost 24d.; but there is no great variety of fruits in Belgium. We staid in this town one night.

The road from Tirlemont to St. Tron is straight; the steeple of the latter being visible in the distant perspective, from the gates of the former. The

whole country is very interesting to an agriculturist. Every where the finest fields and meadows extend to the view, bearing crops of corn, chicorée, clover, hemp, and grass. Villages, with their slender spires, arise from little clumps of foliage, and even the humblest cottages are clean and wholesome in appearance. Trees are yet scanty, being planted only around villages: hedges are never seen. The wheat and barley crops had been housed. Hemp was uncut, and a great quantity of oats remained in stacks. The peasantry are well dressed the costume of the country-women is very similar to that of the Welsh: the men, too, wear the dark blue striped stocking in use among that people. It is well known that Pembrokeshire, the neighbourhood of Neath, and other parts of Wales, were colonized in early ages by the Flemings: to this day, it is said, the Flemings feel a reluctance to mingle their race with that of the aboriginal Britons, and vice versâ; and I have often fancied I have perceived the difference in features between the two people.

St. Tron is an old town with antique houses. The women are good-looking, nicely dressed, and well set off by a little ruff in the Queen Mary style, that has all the properties of an electrical machine in fetching sparks from the hearts of the most obdurate. I thought of devoting a whole

VOL. I.

chapter to these ruffs, but the girls of Zug and Lucerne frowned when I told them so, and obtained a promise that I would dismiss the Braband ruffles in a single sentence. St. Tron, like every other town and hamlet, swarmed with soldiers, who, with the priests, met the eye at every corner.

Saw the ancient town of Tongres, mentioned by Pliny, to the left. The approach to Liége is beautiful: the flat country reaching from the German Sea gives place to undulating hills, clumps of woodland, and rocks covered with underwood.

Liége lies on the banks of the river Meuse (Maas), and from the open country we descended a steep hill to the town, having a goodly prospect of it, with the river and surrounding scenery. Dusk was gathering around us as we entered this singular old town, and by the time we had alighted from the diligence of Van Gend and Co.*, it was dark. We threaded our way through a labyrinth of high, narrow streets, to the Hôtel de France, kept by Monsieur Jean Blondel; where we procured attention, civility, excellent quarters, and moderate charges, and where--But I mean to have a separate chapter about inns.

* The most efficient stage-coach company in Belgium.

CHAPTER V.

A CHAPTER FOR THE GOURMAND.

ALL tourists will allow that one of the principal considerations in travelling is the choice of hotels. English hotels are generally good and dear. Continental hotels are generally good and cheap; and in that lies the difference.

Cry the first "We are large, our rooms are well carpetted, and redfaced are our fire-places." Rejoin the second-" Truly, Messieurs Anglais, you say right; but we, too, are spacious; and although our rooms have no carpets, they have good massive German-stoves, that warm the feet and the back, without glaring the eye."

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'Aye, aye, but consider our old Port at a dollar a bottle."

"Our vin ordinaire is a franc; our Volney, three; and Chambertin itself but four."