Would be dispensed with in future; as "Philosophy had done a great deal of
harm and had caused the French Revolution."
With respect to my visit to Versailles, I was much struck with the vast
size and magnificence of the buildings and with the ingenuity displayed in
the arrangement of the grounds and the numerous groups of statues,
grottos, aqueducts, fountains and ruins. Still it pleases me less than St
Cloud, for I prefer the taste of the present day in gardening and the
arrangement of ground, to the ponderous and tawdry taste of the time of
Louis XIV, and I prefer St Cloud to Versailles, just as I should prefer a
Grecian Nymph in the simple costume of Arcadia to a fine court lady rouged
and dressed out with hoops, diamonds, and headdress of the tune of Queen
Anne. Napoleon must have had an exquisite taste.
[32] Exceptions to this are, I understand, the Gallery at Florence, and the
Museo Vaticano at Rome, which are both open to all and no fees allowed.
[33] Johann Wilhelm Archenholz (1743-1812), author of the Geschichte des
Siebenjaehrigen Krieges, 1789. - ED.
[34] In February, 1781, before the declaration of war was generally known
in the West Indies, Rodney's fleet surrounded the Dutch island of
Eustatius, which had become a sort of entrepot for supplying America
with British goods; two hundred and fifty ships, together with several
millions worth of merchandise, were seized and sold at a military
auction.
