m
the assistance of any member who may be
in distress. It is, however, a subject of
complaint, that these early associations
tend to limit the affections too exclusively
within their own narrow circle, on which
account some parents do not wish their
children to belong to them. The Genevese
females who marry foreigners, and
leave their native city, are often haunted
by the agreeable recollections of their early
societies, and are too apt to regard a residence
elsewhere as a banishment. The
soul of a true Genevese woman is bounded
by the range of the Jura, on one side, and
by the Saleve on the other. The space
between is her world, to which she ever
wishes to return.
The Genevese have often been accused
of an overweening attachment to money,
and even some of their own writers are
disposed to admit, that avarice is the too
prevailing and easily besetting sin of their
countrymen. 1 am, however, inclined to
believe that the Genevese are often thought
avaricious by the English residents, when
they really are not so, arising from the
different habits of the two nations. The
French and Genevese keep their accounts
in halfpence and francs, hence they
are unavoidably more careful of small sums,
than the English who keep their accounts
in pounds, and are daily familiarised with
laro-e sums. The extravagance of the O O
higher classes in England, and the late
profuse expenditure of government, has
created such a rage for expense, that the
great majority of the people live up to, or
beyond their incomes. Among the French
and Genevese on the contrary, economy in
domestic affairs is habitually carried to
an extreme, of which the English can form
no idea ; but the individuals who practise
this economy are often liberal and generous
to others, and therefore cannot be
called avaricious. How much superior are
they in moral worth, to those who spend
the whole of their incomes in selfish indulgences,
and the gratifications o f pride.
The extent to which economy in small
thiims is carried on the o continent,^ struck
me very forcibly, when, in Prevot’s Restaurateur
at Paris, in 1819. A very respectable
looking well-dressed gentleman
seated himself opposite to me at table.
The first dish he called for, as is customary
in the winter season, was a plate of oysters.
G 2