Two Or Three
Of Them Have About Four Or Five Hundred A Year:
The rest, in general,
may have about one hundred pistoles, arising from the silk, oil, wine,
and oranges, produced in their small plantations, where they have
also country houses.
Some few of these are well built,
commodious, and situated; but, for the most part, they are
miserable enough. Our noblesse, notwithstanding their origin, and
the cheap rate at which their titles have been obtained, are
nevertheless extremely tenacious of their privileges, very
delicate in maintaining the etiquette, and keep at a very stately
distance from the Bourgeoisie. How they live in their families, I
do not choose to enquire; but, in public, Madame appears in her
robe of gold, or silver stuff, with her powder and frisure, her
perfumes, her paint and her patches; while Monsieur Le Comte
struts about in his lace and embroidery. Rouge and fard are more
peculiarly necessary in this country, where the complexion and
skin are naturally swarthy and yellow. I have likewise observed,
that most of the females are pot-bellied; a circumstance owing, I
believe, to the great quantity of vegetable trash which they eat.
All the horses, mules, asses, and cattle, which feed upon grass,
have the same distension. This kind of food produces such acid
juices in the stomach, as excite a perpetual sense of hunger. I
have been often amazed at the voracious appetites of these
people. You must not expect that I should describe the tables and
the hospitality of our Nissard gentry. Our consul, who is a very
honest man, told me, he had lived four and thirty years in the
country, without having once eat or drank in any of their houses.
The noblesse of Nice cannot leave the country without express
leave from the king; and this leave, when obtained, is for a
limited time, which they dare not exceed, on pain of incurring
his majesty's displeasure. They must, therefore, endeavour to
find amusements at home; and this, I apprehend, would be no easy
task for people of an active spirit or restless disposition. True
it is, the religion of the country supplies a never-failing fund
of pastime to those who have any relish for devotion; and this is
here a prevailing taste. We have had transient visits of a
puppet-shew, strolling musicians, and rope-dancers; but they did
not like their quarters, and decamped without beat of drum. In
the summer, about eight or nine at night, part of the noblesse
may be seen assembled in a place called the Pare; which is,
indeed, a sort of a street formed by a row of very paltry houses
on one side, and on the other, by part of the town-wall, which
screens it from a prospect of the sea, the only object that could
render it agreeable. Here you may perceive the noblesse stretched
in pairs upon logs of wood, like so many seals upon the rocks by
moon-light, each dame with her cicisbeo:
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